This month’s Across the Page features Patricia Cornwell’s The Scarpetta Factor (Putnam), The Others, by Seba Al-Herz (Seven Stories), and Caprice Crane’s Family Affair (Bantam Books).
The Scarpetta Factor by Patricia Cornwell (Putnam)
Out author Patricia Cornwell‘s latest release, The Scarpetta Factor, opens with the formidable Dr. Kay Scarpetta at the New York City’s Office of the Chief Medical Examiner. She has just finished her third autopsy of the day: a woman in her mid-twenties named Toni Darien who was found raped and murdered by the edge of Central Park shortly before dawn.
The case should be straightforward, but the condition of Darien’s body does not fit with the details of the crime.
As Scarpetta works to figure out exactly what happened, we get an inside look into all of the major players in the investigation: Lucy Farinelli, Scarpetta’s lesbian niece, whose lover Jamie Berger is the Assistant District Attorney on the case; Benton Wesley, Scarpetta’s husband and a forensic psychologist whose patient may be connected to the crime; and detective Pete Marino who is now working as an investigator for Berger.
Scarpetta is also trying to manage her new role as a Senior Forensic Analyst for CNN – she is a contributor to Carley Crispin’s show, The Crispin Report. Her aim is to educate the public, who believe that forensic science is accurately portrayed in shows like CSI. But the role is more stressful than rewarding, as Crispin breaks their agreement and asks questions about cases that Scarpetta is currently working on and can’t discuss.
Though Scarpetta still doubts the details of Darien’s case, Marino wonders if she is the one who’s mistaken: “He’d seen it happen time and again, people believe their own press and quit doing the real work, and they f— up and make fools of themselves.”
But soon Scarpetta’s team begins to connect the Darien case with Hannah Star, a beautiful and extremely wealthy heiress, and a movie star named Hap Judd, who Lucy and Berger are investigating.
In the midst of the investigation, Cornwell also weaves tension throughout the relationships: Marino doubts Scarpetta’s analysis; Wesley is unable to tell his wife about his past; and Lucy and Berger are suspicious of each, though not for the right reasons.
Cornwell is the number one crime novelist in the world and her attention to detail and her ability to bring the latest forensic science into the story are both remarkable.
If you’re looking for a good crime mystery, with just a touch of lesbian intrigue, pick it up.
The Others by Seba Al-Herz (Seven Stories)
Seba Al-Herz’s gripping novel, The Others, is a multi-layered story about a young Shi’a woman growing up in the Sunni province of Saudi Arabia. The title applies to nearly every aspect of the unnamed narrator’s life, from her gender, to her epilepsy, to her same-sex relationships with other women.
The Others captures a year in the narrator’s life and opens with her most recent separation from her lover Dai who “knew how to turn things on their heads, how to fabricate a long chain of reactions to the single and sickly action that I was.”
The relationship, which much of the book records, is tremulous, passionate and filled with fear and desire. “Did I say, The act of love is exhausting? Then what about the act of desire!”
As the narrator struggles with this separation, we learn how the relationship began with the two women meeting at the local women’s college. When they finally reunite, they go away on a trip with other closeted lesbians for the weekend, and the narrator is seduced by one of Dai’s friends, Dareen.
Al-Herz writes about desire in beautiful prose that ranges from the poetic and surreal to startling moments of clarity: “We awoke. When I say we awoke I mean it literally. We woke up from the bewitching trance of words, from the honey sweetness of dreams, to an electric shock that flew from her bare forearm to mine … Staring through the window at some distant point, she whispered, I want to kiss you. I did not say a word.”
Dai soon learns about the betrayal and she takes out her jealousy and anger through an act of sexual violence. It is the final break, and the narrator finds comfort with Dareen. Their relationship is sweet and romantic, but haunted by the narrator’s unresolved feelings for Dai, and Dareen’s love for her first girlfriend.
The narrator encourages Dareen to return to her first love and then tells her close male friend, Omar, about her relationship with Dai. He is entirely supportive and claims that it doesn’t change the way he sees her. With Omar’s support, the narrator contacts Dai again, but their reunion is not what she hoped for or expected.
Throughout The Others, the narrator struggles with her developing sexuality under very real restrictions, and she sleeps with women and flirting with a man online.
Al-Herz weaves this story of identity and love against the backdrop of intense political and cultural tensions. The translator provides additional context in the extremely interesting afterward:
Although this novel has drawn notice for its portrayal of same-sex relationships among young Saudi women, its forthrightness about life for the Shi’i minority of Saudi Arabia seen through the eyes of young Saudis, may be more radical.
Seba Al-Herz is actually the pseudonym of a twenty-six-year-old Saudi woman from al-Qatif in Saudi Arabia. The Others, her first novel, is a powerful, important and engaging work. Though the end is underdeveloped and difficult to interpret, the story brings the reader into a world and mind with beautiful specificity and insight.
It is an eye-opening reading experience. Highly recommended.
Family Affair by Caprice Crane (Bantam Books)
Caprice Crane’s third novel, Family Affair, begins with a question: Can a person win custody of their in-laws in a divorce settlement?
The divorcing couple here is Layla Brennan and her high school sweetheart Brett Foster. Layla’s father left her family when she was young and after her mother died she instantly became a part of the Foster family. Perhaps too instantly, thinks Brett, who now feels like she is more his sister than wife.
Layla and Brett obviously see things differently and the novel features multiple points of view, none all that deeply, to capture the impact of the couple’s separation on the family: Trish, Brett’s lesbian sister who is business partners with Layla and also a voice of reason; Scott, Brett’s brother and secret admirer of Layla; and Brett’s mother, Ginny, who reveals her perspective through letters to her sister.
Though Trish has her own point of view, her perspective is as underdeveloped as the other characters. She plays the smart and witty lesbian sidekick, but doesn’t necessarily have a compelling story line of her own.
The lawyer that Layla hires to handle the divorce doesn’t take seriously her idea to fight for custody of the family, but he does manage to mediate a negotiation that allows the couple alternate weekends with the Fosters.
Neither is necessarily happy with the arrangement and the couple continues to fight over the weekends and compete with each other for the family’s affection. Brett feels betrayed by his family, telling them, “I hope none of you traitors ever need any blood. Because I’m O negative – the universal donor.”
Layla is dealing with abandonment issues from her father’s leaving and mother’s death, plus the Fosters are “they only real family I’ve ever had.”
In the meantime, Brett spends time with another woman named Heather, but is mostly disappointed and disillusioned by the dating scene. As the formula goes, just as Layla finally decides it’s time to move on in her life, Brett begins to change his mind about the divorce.
What is ultimately disappointing about the book is that though the premise is interesting – the idea that we lose more than the spouse in a divorce – Crane does not analyze any of the characters with empathy. Rather than seeing or experiencing the genuine struggle of separation, we hear about it from a superficial perspective.
The story becomes somewhat more complicated when the letters that Ginny has been writing to her sister reflect a larger concern for the family. But for the most part, the book doesn’t crack the surface.
