First published 10 years ago, NINETEEN SEVENTY-FOUR is the first in British author David Peace’s “Red Riding Quartet,” now available on this side of the pond, thanks to Vintage Crime/Black Lizard. And that means those previously familiar with Peace’s later works, such as TOKYO YEAR ZERO, can now experience his earlier efforts, while lovers of noir fiction can now add him to their list of writers to discover.
It’s mid-December 1974, in northern England’s Yorkshire county. Eddie Dunford, the newly appointed crime correspondent for the YORKSHIRE POST, is among the several local reporters gathered at the police station to hear the official announcement: A young girl named Clare Kemplay has disappeared on her way home from school.
Dunford and everyone else gathered fear the worst. And, sure enough, it isn’t long before the body of Clare is discovered brutally murdered. The police, and most of Dunford’s fellow journalists, see the homicide as an isolated incident. But Dunford discovers similarities between Clare’s case and other young girls who, a few years earlier, also disappeared and then turned up dead.
Ignoring the advice of his boss and fellow reporters, Dunford decides to dig deeper into the earlier cases to see if there is a link to the death of Clare. But the more he finds about the lives of the dead girls and their families, the more disturbing things become. Eventually, one fellow reporter at Dunford’s paper is found dead. And it isn’t long before Dunford finds himself in a pit of corruption, blackmail and violence that threatens his own life.
The above plot summary might lead you conclude that NINETEEN SEVENTY-FOUR is a rather standard murder mystery. But nothing could be further from the truth. In reality, it is a dark, disturbing exercise in noir prose style. Peace’s first-person narration is often jumpy, jarring and blunt, peppered with offhand pop-culture references to the time period, as well as the depressing, cold and damp weather and the equally bleak working-class settings. And as Dunford’s search brings him nearer to the truth, Peace heightens the urgency of his prose to a downright nightmarish quality.
Not surprisingly, this first novel is often compared to James Ellroy. Indeed that unrelenting, swirling, obsessive ambience that Ellroy displays in many of his works is evident in NINETEEN SEVENTY-FOUR. And, much like Ellroy, reading it for extended periods can be an almost suffocating experience. But taken sparingly, it is a work that can’t help but leave a lasting impression, even for those well-read in the darkest of noir prose.
But, like the well-known saying goes, it’s only the beginning, folks. Peace continues the dissection of underbelly of his native Yorkshire in three more novels, and Vintage Crime/Black Lizard promises the second book of the quartet, NINETEEN SEVENTY-SEVEN, to see U.S. publication in May. That should give us enough time to catch our breath, dust ourselves off and generally clear our heads before the next dunking. —Alan Cranis
Related posts:
{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
Well I’ll be watching the BBC version of the book later on tonight, as well as the other books of the series that are airing over the next few weeks.