Diary of an Autodidact: Eight Perfect Murders by Peter Swanson

Source of book: Borrowed from the library.

This was this month’s selection for our “Literary Lush” book club. One of the things I enjoy about this club is that I end up reading interesting books that I never would have discovered on my own. This book certainly qualifies, as I had no idea it existed. Back when I was a teen, I used to read a lot of murder mysteries, and mysteries in general, but have done so less as I have gotten older. My wife and I have had extensive discussions of the mystery genre over the years - she is actually the true expert.

The basic premise of this book is the re-creation or homage perhaps to the eight most perfect murders found in murder mysteries. The very unreliable narrator, Malcolm Kershaw, wrote a blog post a decade ago with a list of these eight murders. Years later, he is contacted by an FBI agent who is noticing a string of murders that seem to be related to the list - the murderer is following the list, so to speak. Malcolm is consulted, as it seems, because of his knowledge of the books on the list, which may help stop the murderer before he or she finishes the murders.

I’m not even sure where to go from there, because anything would be a spoiler, it seems. Although, to be honest, it isn’t terribly difficult to figure out the mystery, and many of the revelations happen early in the book. In fact, one of the oddities is how long the book takes to tie everything up at the end - really a few chapters. I suspect this is because the author has to explain how all the murders fit the specific books.

And that leads me to the thing I disliked most about the book. It seems to be much more about the references to the other books than about its own plot or characters. In fact, the lack of characters is part of the problem. There are essentially two that are enough to be considered significant, with a few more that make very small appearances. And that includes the murderer, which is somewhat problematic within the rules of the genre, in my opinion.

I also felt that the plot drew heavily from a couple of other mysteries, and that these plots (which are part of the list) substitute for characterization. Even for the narrator, who is the only character we get to know in any depth, he is both unlikeable (and not in the sense that you hate him, more that you don’t really care) and self-focused, so you don’t really get a sense of anything outside of his own head.

My final issue is one a few members of our club noted, which is that both the action and the mystery development mostly occur in the first half, with a lot less of interest after that. The book really loses steam, and never recovers it. Some of this is definitely because the big reveals happen too soon, and most of the lesser reveals in the second half feel anticlimactic to me.

I should mention one line, however, that is quite good.

The thing is, and maybe I’m biased by all those years I’ve spent in fictional realms based on deceit, I don’t trust narrators any more than I trust the actual people in my life. We never get the whole truth, not from anybody. When we first meet someone, before words are ever spoken, there are already lies and half-truths. The clothes we wear cover the truth of our bodies, but they also present who we want to be to the world. They are fabrications, figuratively and literally.

That is spoken like a lawyer, to be sure. But it isn’t a great way to look at the world of other people as a general rule. The complexity of image and reality and self-conception are what make us human, not true deceit. The other telling confession by the narrator is that he feels that he knows more about people when he meets them, and they become more and more strangers as he gets to know them. That, and other things in the book point in the direction of his being a sociopath, as other club members pointed out.

The book itself was a bit disappointing to me. Our discussion of the mystery genre, however, was a lot of fun. Which goes to show that the important thing is having good people in a book club - even a meh book can become a fascinating meeting.

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Just for fun, here is the list of books that our book club has read. At least the ones I have read too. Most of these were read for the club, but a few were ones I read previously - those posts pre-date the club discussion - and some I read afterward, because I missed the discussion. A few of the books were “optional” second books for a given month.

Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng

Eight Perfect Murders by Peter Swanson

Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu

The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

Born Standing Up by Steve Martin

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

Big Sur by Jack Kerouac

The Man In The High Castle by Philip K. Dick

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong