How I Won a Nobel Prize by Julius Taranto

Published by Little, Brown and Company on September 12, 2023

How I Won a Nobel Prize is centered around the concept of “woke” education. A wealthy conservative named B.W. Rubin endowed a private university called the Rubin Institute. The Institute purchased an island off the coast of Connecticut, built a tower, and staffed it with deplorable professors: racists, gropers, zealots. The Institute is portrayed to the public as a sort of punitive exile for professors who can’t follow the rules, but the faculty — consisting almost entirely of white males — loves the place. They can sleep with students, harass them, and use all the offensive language they can imagine, never suffering consequences.

Since the island has a nice beach, the Institute became a “Sandals for scandal” with no HR director, no code of conduct. The Institute charges no tuition, so it gets bright students who suffer the harassment in exchange for an education as well as the Young Republicans who relish their entitlement. If students are concerned about attending school on the island (known on the mainland as Rape Island), they were invited to carry Mace.

B.W. Rubin is sleazy in a way that is unique to the truly rich. He is convinced that any action he takes to gain more wealth and power is justified, even if he must dominate worthier people to enrich himself.

Helen was a graduate assistant at Cornell, working with Nobel Laureate Perry Smoot to create a model that would help them create superconductive substances at ordinary temperatures. The novel explains superconductivity and Helen’s quest in a way that even I can (superficially) understand, and I’m no physicist. Math and coding are Helen’s strength, while Perry is the one who make intuitive leaps. Some of the novel’s best writing — and it’s all exceptional — comes from Helen’s descriptions about what it’s like to be “in the zone,” when she is coding with almost supernatural confidence, “pirouetting between raindrops, seeing the whole vast board,” certain that she is about to solve a difficult problem.

Perry is gay. He became unwelcome at Cornell after a male graduate student reported that Perry made a pass at him. Conversely, Perry’s sexual harassment makes him welcome at the Rubin Institute. Helen feels compelled to follow Perry because the only other expert conducting similar research is in China and she doesn’t speak Mandarin.

Helen’s lover is a liberal IT guy who objects to living in the obnoxious environment of Rape Island before he relents and follows Helen. Their relationship is strained by the move, although Helen has so little time for Hew that the relationship has never been great. In any event, Helen is thinking of having an affair with a literary writer who has been exiled to the Institute. The writer was much admired before he became so literary that ordinary readers could not grasp the point of his work.

Helen’s relationship with Hew becomes a quirky subplot when Helen uses equations and spreadsheets to decide whether she should stay with him. She is surprised when the answer is always the same. She doesn’t realize that, for all the math, the equations rely on subjective data and therefore return subjective answers. I suppose you can listen to your heart or you can listen to the results of math problems that are driven by your heart.

How I Won a Nobel Prize isn’t a romance novel, but romance is part of life, whether we welcome it or not. Perry makes an interesting argument that, because he is socially dysfunctional outside the academic environment, his only hope of romantic happiness is to have a relationship with a student/lover. He views teaching as forming an erotic connection with students. It’s a bit self-serving, but I can understand his feeling that it’s unfair to ban him from the only relationships that might give him a chance to love. I disagree that it’s unfair, but I appreciated the contribution his perspective makes to an understanding of the dynamics of professor/student relationships.

Although it represents a smaller part of the story, the novel asks an interesting question about the correct balance between academic freedom and disciplining faculty members for the opinions they express. Of somewhat greater significance to the story is Hew’s concern about the disparity of power that might allow people of wealth or fame to escape judgment for immoral or illegal conduct. Helen counters that people who have made valuable contributions to society should not be defined by their worst actions. Why can’t we admire the good things people did even if we detest their misconduct?

The novel also suggests the use of Artificial Intelligence to make the administrative decisions of government, replacing self-interest with a computer-generated understanding of the nation’s core moral beliefs. I’m not sure how that would work in the real world, but it’s an intriguing solution to the role that wealth and power play in the political system. Finally, Helen has a fascinating epiphany about the nature of commitment and how it is used as a respite from the burden of constantly making choices.

While How I Won a Nobel Prize is marketed as a comedy, probably because the premise of a university for deplorables is darkly amusing, but it is largely a novel of ideas. Idea-driven novels are always at risk of bogging down, but an entertaining plot keeps the story in motion. Plot lines simmer until Julius Taranto brings them to a boil in an explosive and unexpected climax. In fact, the entire story, from beginning to end, is unexpected and surprising. It’s also the best debut novel, and possibly the smartest novel, I’ve read this year.

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South by Babak Lakghomi

Published by Dundurn Press/Rare Machines on September 12, 2023

“What is considered innocent today may not be so tomorrow.” That Kafkaesque explanation for B.’s plight sets the tone in South, a novel in which authoritarian rulers censor books, erase their critics, and change the rules without notice.

The time and place in which the novel is set is never identified. That choice underscores the risk that authoritarianism can arise at any time in any nation.

After a drought, men moved south to work on oil rigs. Those jobs won’t last because oil production is exceeding demand. Steel factories and refineries are closing. Strikes are shutting down industrial cities; union leaders have mysteriously disappeared. Independent fishermen can’t compete against the big industrial ships. Wells are going dry; fresh water is scarce. Diseases have spread for which medicine had no cure. The legendary people of the wind perform rituals to drive diseases from the body. Whether the rituals work is a matter of opinion or faith.

B.’s father brought unions together. B. is writing a book about his father to help him understand his father’s disappearance. His mother believes his father left to protect the family. B. knows he won’t be allowed to write about his father’s union activism, but the publisher has sanitized the first chapters to make his father unrecognizable. The last book B. completed was about storks, but he had to avoid mentioning the environmental destruction that is wiping them out.

Now B. is driving south because his Editor asked him to write a report about an oil rig. He is to write what he sees or learns from the workers. The assignment puzzles B. but he wants to please the Editor. The Company has given him permission to visit but isn’t cooperating with his investigation.

B. is stymied by the resistance of workers to his interview requests. He gets information from an assistant cook who disappears. He watches a man set himself on fire. Otherwise, he has little to write about and he's afraid to send his editor the few facts that are worth reporting. He hides his notebook but it soon disappears.

Eventually B. is imprisoned on a ship and isolated. He is forced to write whenever he’s awake. He doesn’t know what to write, but his interrogator implies that writing is the key to his freedom. It is more likely the reason for his imprisonment. The interrogation is designed to reshape B.’s thoughts, to sever him from his identity. Only after the interrogator believes his will is broken does B. see other prisoners on the ship, including a woman he encountered on the rig. Even his silent efforts to commune with her are thwarted, or so it seems to B.

When B. narrates his backstory, we learn that he drinks too much, makes poor choices, and has low self-esteem. He lives with Tara but had an indiscreet moment with a woman he met in a bookstore. He receives a package on the rig that suggests the encounter was a setup. Then he receives unsettling news about Tara. He doesn’t know if anything he learns is real. His experiences are eventually indistinguishable from hallucinations. His dreams merge with visions that merge with reality.

Kafka’s vision of ordinary innocents trapped in the bewildering absurdity of authoritarian rule never loses its relevance. It probably won’t be a spoiler to suggest that authoritarian rule will leave B. a broken man. Breaking people is the point of authoritarianism. Is there a possibility of recovery from such damage? The novel provides no clear answer but leaves room for hope.

Late in the story, characters debate the best response to authoritarianism. The media is state-controlled and the news can’t be trusted. Protests lead to tear gas and beatings and confinement. The state relies on terror to control its citizens, but it can’t lock up everyone. When it locks up writers and other people with known faces, it sparks more protest.

In the long run, perhaps resistance is not futile. “Working within the system” can be perceived as cowardice or selling out. It can also be seen as self-protection or a strategy of incremental change. These debates are relevant to people who live under authoritarian rule. They’re also important to people who recognize the danger of electing authoritarians in a democracy.

South is published by a Canadian publisher, but Babak Lakghomi’s home country is Iran. He understands how government propaganda is used to control and confuse. Trump’s press secretary presented “alternative facts” when confronted with real facts, a small example of how misinformation is wielded as a tool of government even in a relatively free democracy.

Lakghomi tells his story in a minimalist style from the perspective of an unremarkable protagonist. Those choices assure that nothing distracts from his powerful reminder of how authoritarianism can creep into any environment and change the life of any person who makes even a small effort to question authority.

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Happy Labor Day!

(in advance)

Not Forever, But For Now by Chuck Palahniuk

Published by Simon & Schuster on September 5, 2023

Chuck Palahniuk has a long history of writing dark stories about creepy characters. His novels have been described as twisted, disturbing, raunchy, and weird. Palahniuk doubles down on that tradition in Not Forever but for Now.

Otto and Cecil are brothers. Their ages are not quite clear. They think of themselves as “wee pre-male prey.” A nanny bathes Otto and they spend much of their time in a nursery. Yet they steal cars and frequently “have a go,” which in the context of the novel is a sexual reference. The age ambiguity is presumably part of the novel’s absurdist humor.

Cecil narrates the story. He uses “pre-male” as a synonym for gay. When the incestuous gay brothers did not meet his standard for masculinity, their father caved in the head of their pony with a brick “because he wanted his sons not to be always weak, twee, sentimental babies, but to face up to the grim realities of life . . . and to stop messing about with paper dolls.” Cringe-worthy yes, but with the obvious intent of ridiculing the notion that straight men can beat the gay out of their male children.

The brothers come from a family of assassins. The family has done away with Lady Di, Kurt Cobain, Elvis, and many other celebrities. The brothers particularly enjoy reenacting their grandfather’s murder of Judy Garland. Perhaps Palahniuk meant to mock the unlikely speculation that inevitably surrounds a celebrity’s death.

Otto also enjoys imitating Richard Attenborough as he narrates footage of predators stalking and devouring their prey. Taking their cue from Attenborough's dispassionate descriptions of violence in nature, the boys are natural born killers. Nannies, tutors, butlers, and other residents of and visitors to the manor house where they boys reside usually meet a gruesome end. The brothers lure predators to their home with the promise that they can “have a go” with Otto, who leads them on a chase through the woods before dispatching them (sometimes after granting their wish to have a go with him). The village is certain that the house is haunted, as well it should be. The house also seems to have hatched a monster with “extra limbs and breasts and peckers” that now roams the woods. I have no idea what to make of this fantasy element. Perhaps nonsense is its own reward.

Their grandfather is grooming the brothers for criminal enterprises other than homicide. He instruct them to steal expensive cars as part of an insurance fraud scheme. He launches an app that involves a suicide lottery and assigns the brothers to assist the suicides. Cecil's commentary suggests that the app will play a key role in plot development, but readers looking for a plot are likely to be disappointed.

To the extent that the novel has a plot, I suppose it develops in the last act. Much of the story is a family drama, complete with schemes by family members to kill other family members. Eventually the story moves to a prison and a plan to create an army of “fey, feeble pre-males with little education and no prospects,” calling upon them “to hold up chip shops and to monger whores.” This leads to a “twee” crime wave, a “pre-male revolution” that engulfs England.

Like much of Palahniuk’s work, Not Forever but for Now is primarily an exercise in describing violent and demented acts with clever prose. Perhaps Palahniuk intends to satirize people who view homosexuality as demented, but it is difficult to square that interpretation with grizzly depictions of murder and sexual encounters that are clearly nonconsensual. Perhaps he intended to satirize crime fiction, but if the reader needs to guess at the point of satire, the humor loses its punch.

Palahniuk more clearly satirizes the British empire (or its remnants), royalty, the ruling class, social media, and a prison system that supposedly “coddles” predators by housing them with an endless supply of prey. Those are easy targets, yet Palahniuk barely hits them.

The story has its funny moments. Stealing the queen’s debit card made me laugh (her PIN is 1234). She has billions in her account but can only withdraw three hundred pounds a day. Palahniuk combines the male complaint about emasculation with the female complaint about toxic masculinity to arrive at “toxic emasculation.” I laughed at that, but there are few other moments of inspired comedy.

When I was young I might have enjoyed the story for its shock value, but I am now too old to be shocked by much of anything. Palahniuk was fresh and original in Fight Club but hasn’t ever returned to that form. I can recommend Not Forever but for Now to readers who enjoy mockery for the sake of mockery, but the story lacks sufficient entertainment value to earn a full recommendation.

RECOMMENDED WITH RESERVATIONS

The River We Remember by William Kent Krueger

Published by Atria Books on September 5, 2023

The River We Remember offers crime fiction fans a balanced blend of plot and characterization. Rooted in dysfunctional families, the story is a murder mystery that sets up suspects who might have committed a murder that caused no great loss to the community. Set in rural Minnesota in the 1950s, the action takes place against a background of post-war hatred of the Japanese and ongoing hatred of Native Americans.

Brody Dern is the sheriff of Black Earth County. Brody saw too much death in the war. He holds himself responsible for a friend’s death and cannot forgive himself for his actions. He later escaped from a Japanese POW camp and regards himself as a coward for seizing the opportunity to escape. Brody is unmarried but is involved in a relationship that does not reflect well upon his character.

Jimmy Quinn is an abusive drunk. He is the county’s largest landowner and is wealthy and powerful for that reason, although he is almost universally despised. He is on his second wife, a relative of his first wife. A hereditary condition caused the death of his first wife and will soon kill the second. Quinn’s conduct with his other family members is appalling. It isn’t surprising that someone finally killed him.

A man comes across Quinn’s dead body in the Alabaster River. A shotgun blast opened holes Quinn’s body that made his innards accessible to hungry catfish. Surmising that the body floated downriver, Brody leads a search for the location at which Quinn entered the river. He finds Quinn’s shotgun in a large pool of blood near the river. Did he shoot himself, either accidentally or in the commission of suicide? In the absence of an explanation for how a man who lost so much blood could have entered the river under his own power, it seems likely that he was murdered.

Brody does his best to avoid drawing that conclusion. He doesn’t think it will be good for the county to search for a murderer who did the community a favor by dispatching Quinn. Circumstances (and the former sheriff’s persistent reminders that Brody has a job to do) nevertheless force Brody to undertake a murder investigation.

Community suspicion quicky focuses on Noah Bluestone, a Dakota Sioux who returned from the war married to a Japanese woman. His race and the race of his wife are two strikes against him in a community that doesn’t see the need for a third strike. Only the courageous publisher of the local paper stands up for Noah’s right to a fair trial. When ambiguous evidence seems to point to Noah’s guilt, he refuses to take any action to defend himself for reasons that become part of the underlying mystery.

Tyler Creasy is another abusive drunk. He’s certain that Noah killed Quinn because Quinn fired Noah and his wife from their jobs as farmhand and housekeeper. Creasy has a son named Del who is a good friend of a boy named Sam. The boys’ mischief forms a subplot that eventually merges with the main story. While subplots pile on other subplots, it is a credit to William Kent Krueger that the story never becomes confusing.

Romance provides additional subplots. Unaware of Brody’s messy romantic entanglement, Sam’s mother Angie would like to have a go at Brody. Like Brody, she has a dark backstory. Whether Brody will (or can) return her affection is a subplot that adds interest to Brody’s life. He’s a troubled man who, despite being haunted by regrettable decisions, is a reasonably decent individual. It is easy for a reader to want Brody’s participation in the story to end well.

The plot is complicated by the drama that infects multiple families who are important to the story. The reader will need to sort through a good bit of dirty laundry to learn whether Noah or someone else killed Quinn.

By the end of the story, other lives are placed in peril, giving rise to a couple of credible action scenes. The conclusion is not entirely happy. I respect Krueger’s willingness to write an honest story that doesn’t pander to readers who want their fictional worlds to be better than the real world. At the same time, the unhappy aspect of the novel is convenient in its creation of an ending that will improve the lives of other characters who will have earned the reader’s sympathy.

Quinn’s complexity is at war with his desire for simplicity. That conflict makes him interesting. The key women in the novel have all lived difficult lives but have all persevered. One became a lawyer who is appointed to defend Noah. The women of greatest importance to the story have managed to retain a sense of decency and compassion. They have a strength that the evil men who surround them lack.

That so many people with such tragic lives have all collected in a rural county in Minnesota might be hard to believe, but who knows the secrets harbored by people who live in remote locations? People do what they want to do, uninhabited by their violation of the values that their community professes to follow. I easily set aside my skepticism about the onrush of subplots so that I could enjoy a strong mystery that is populated by an abundance of well-developed characters.

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