The Good Liar, by Denise Mina review: 'taut and cunning'
Part of what makes Denise Mina such an interesting writer of crime fiction is the moral and ethical questions she poses, writes Stuart Kelly
Amphibology. It’s a smart word for a simple concept, the syntactic or lexical wriggle-room that generates double meanings. Examples might be the scene in Carnivale where the freakshow drums up interest in “man eating chicken” or the reviewer’s standby, “I shall lose no time in reading your book”. As titles, the crime genre has an especial fondness for them, but I think this is the first of Denise Mina’s to use the device. Does the title mean “an individual exceptionally adept at fibbing” or “a morally upright person with an unfortunate propensity for deception”? The trick is to keep a gap as to both meanings, and to which of the characters the title refers. Although this is technically a crime novel, it is notable that the press release calls it a suspense novel. While that is apposite, moral calculus novel works well too.
The central character is Dr Claudia O’Sheil, a scientist and forensic specialist whose modelling, particularly of blood splatters, has earned her a lucrative position with a data and testing company, ForSci Ltd. If her professional star is in the ascendant, however, her personal life is not: her husband, an investigative reporter, has died, and she is gnawed by suspicions it may have been suicide.
She is called away from a glitzy opening ceremony with her friend, Sir Philip Ardmore, the owner and founder of ForSci Ltd, about to be elevated to chair of the Forensic Ethics Committee. Someone has stabbed to death Ardmore’s schoolfriend Viscount ‘Jonty’ Stewart, as well as slicing his younger, second wife Francesca’s throat and blowing the head off the guard dog. So, plenty for a blood splatter expert to do. The Viscount was at odds with his druggie son, William, and whoever committed the crime loathed Jonty so much his groin and genitals have been mutilated post-mortem. William, however, appears to have an alibi.
Although this is the initial positioning of the pieces, it is framed by a narrative one year in the future, with Shiel, now an MBE, about to give a speech at the newly refurbished Royal College of Forensic Scientists, organised by Philip, now Lord, Ardmore. She does not intend to give the speech they think she is to give, and in fact is steeling herself to scupper her whole career by confessing to errors in her methodology. Mina strategically places a reference to Shaken Baby Syndrome, which came under scrutiny from the outset. But without going into details, any reader can do the rough maths. Even a 99.9% accuracy rate means a possible one in a thousand errors.
Crime fiction may have moved on from the classic whodunnit formula, but in doing so it has found different challenges. DNA evidence is far less novelistic than deduction and hunches. AI is much quicker at checking databases than a grizzled detective and a musty filing cabinet. Part of what makes Mina such an interesting writer is that the science is a background to the moral and ethical questions she is posing, not an end in itself, as it might be in the increasingly strained versions of Patricia Cornwell or Kathy Reichs.
The double narrative provides two strands of jeopardy and tension. William is conspicuously unsplattered, even if doubts creep in about his alibi. O’Sheil is convinced of his innocence and perturbed that he pleads guilty nonetheless. If not him, who? Complications arise about the reliability of her statistics alongside concerns about the actual ownership of the company, which might tie in with her husband’s death. Part of what is so convincing and troubling in this is the subtle unravelling of multiple affiliations of class and aristocratic loyalties. The other is the countdown to O’Sheil’s revelation, and this is done very adroitly: I genuinely was unsure, 50 pages from the end, whether she would go through with her revelations. In part this is due to a subtle and slow increase of emoluments and favours and quiet words which might not be illegal but which neatly bind O’Sheil – not to mention ever-so-quietly whispered hints of threats.
The class system has always been the unsung villain of Mina’s books. O’Sheil’s sister is a recovering addict; there is a slightly raffish lawyer who has a healthy degree of scepticism towards those and such as those; there is a sense of how precarious careers can be without aristocratic largesse and protection. The double plot also makes this a tauter affair than some of Mina’s novels, and this can be seen particularly in her very cunning way of introducing minor characters as if they were merely “also starring”. One character is introduced almost as a caricature – “his money was as old as his face was red”, “he was what they feared they might be: rich and dull and only invited out of obligation because he donated to everything”, “I can’t abide that braying fool” – an assessment from O’Sheil, and as principal character, one with which the reader subconsciously accedes. This manoeuvre is played more than once, a mild rebuke to the reader’s hasty judgment when the truth is revealed.
I would not call Mina a crusading writer, but there is a feeling that the topics she chooses are not random, but serious and urgent. Given the current state of the world, she is unlikely to run out of nettles to grasp any time soon.
The Good Liar, by Denise Mina, Harvill Secker, 16.99. Denise Mina is at the Edinburgh International Book Festival on 14 August
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