With The Cracked Mirror, Chris Brookmyre uses literary slight-of-hand to wrongfoot readers in the most spectacular fashion, all while honoring the tropes of classic crime fiction. For fans of Brookmyre, this will come as no surprise as he has proven over the years that he is an author more than willing to take huge risks in service to story, but rarely has it succeeded at this level. Unforgettable is a word too often used in critical analysis, but Chris Brookmyre’s The Cracked Mirror is a case where it’s not just the most suitable word, it’s the only word that fairly squares up with what is on the pages of the novel.
The Cracked Mirror begins as two very distinct stories told in the styles of two very different crime fiction subgenres. Penny Coyne is a little old lady living in a quaint English village where she has repeatedly outsmarted the local authorities and helped to solve multiple crimes. (Think Miss Marple, Miss Hortense, or even Jessica Fletcher.) Alternating chapter points of view with Penny are chapters from the perspective of Johnny Hawke, a hardboiled detective stationed in Los Angeles, canvasing the roughest streets in Hollywood while chasing the darkest sector of crime culprits. (Think Harry Bosch or Mo Prager by way of Phillip Marlowe.)
As their individual storylines proceed, genre fans know that at some point these two narratives need to connect (or do they?) Penny and Johnny seem so far removed from each other, it’s hard to imagine where this intersection might occur. That is until Penny is invited to a wedding she has no reason to attend, and Johnny’s latest case has a link to the Scottish castle where that wedding is taking place. Now that they are in the same location, will these two stories converge? Only time will tell.
Chris Brookmyre is never less than completely in control here. The reader is like putty in his hand as he manipulates every expectation of a crime novel, transforming it into something wholly original. His ace-in-the-hole are Penny and Johnny, two characters that readers will feel immense loyalty toward. Once a reader begins The Cracked Mirror, their unique voices will call them back to the page again and again like Odysseus’s sirens.
It would be a fool-hearty mission to attempt to distill down any more of this extremely complex plot—first, because it would be impossible to do it justice and second, because new readers deserve their own sense of discovery along the journey. Suffice to say, seasoned fans of the genre will pick up subtle clues along the way, feeling a sense of discombobulation that’s equally intriguing and off-putting but no doubt addictive. Yet even with that, it’s the rare reader who will anticipate what is about to unfold in the most glorious of ways.
Chris Brookmyre’s The Cracked Mirror deserves to be an instant classic, by which future, experimental, books are compared. Already a McIlvanney Prize Winner, it’s a shame that this book has not yet been published on domestic shores. If you love crime fiction and honor authors who attempt to upend expectations, it’s worth any effort to obtain a copy of The Cracked Mirror by Chris Brookmyre.
BUY LINKS: The Cracked Mirror by Chris Brookmyre
