Regarding author C.B. Everett’s sort-of mystery/suspense novel, “The Final Chapter”: Yes, there is an element of traditional mystery novelization and, as expected, a significant group of surprises in one of the two primary stories comprising this brilliant, puzzling, confusing, two-novels-in-one work of art. And if the preceding sentence already has you a bit confused, hold onto your seat because you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.
If you are expecting that traditional mystery guessing game in which you’re trying to figure out who the murderer is before the author lets you know the answer for sure, you are in for a shock, maybe a disappointment, maybe a realization that THIS author has given you the opportunity to unravel a set of mysteries that require all your detective abilities and your own imagination to even come close to the myriad solutions. When I read, in my advance copy of the novel, that the publisher of the piece dares the reader, on a page preceding the novel itself, to solve the mysteries that fill the pages (I read it after I read the book), I laughed. I thought even gigantic-Einsteinian-brained readers might drive themselves crazy before finally giving up and simply absorbing what the author ultimately reveals.
So here goes — my attempt to briefly summarize this novel-within-a-novel while also offering some clues to the author’s fascinating but intentionally foggy methods. The novel that I’ll label novel #1, written by fictional author Jonathan Durward, is the story of an assassin who is proud of his talents and successes but is saying, in effect, “take me out, Coach. I can’t take this game any more.” However, he is given an ostensibly final assignment by his spy bosses to find and dispose of an international criminal who is so good at disappearing after his criminal acts that he’s known in the business as The Ghost. But our protagonist-hero is also a master of disappearances once his murders are accomplished. After the deed is done, he changes everything about himself — his appearance, his character, his made-up occupation, his name — as he gets ready for his next murderous assignment. That’s why he’s known as a shape-shifter. So the hunter and the hunted are parallel or mirror-image figures.
And that case is one of many identity mix-ups that make up a primary element of “The Final Chapter.” And in further evidence of the technique, the hunter becomes the hunted — another identity mix-up, of course. So it goes in this entire piece of work. The motif of disappearance is a primary element in the novels and in the lives of the most important characters, namely the two first-person narrators, Jon Durward and the fictional C.B. Everett. The name of this novel #1, incidentally, is “Russian Doll,” a reference to the Russian Nesting Dolls, wherein several dolls rest comfortably inside gradually larger dolls; an oblique symbol of the novel-within-a-novel form of “The Final Chapter.”
We learn every stunning detail about the relationship of those two narrators primarily through the details of novel #2, the comments and editing of Everett the character, not to be confused with Everett the author of “The Final Chapter.” Everett the character is given the opportunity to edit “The Russian Doll” because he had been Jon’s closest friend and frenemy before Jon’s shocking disappearance at the height of his popularity and success as a novelist. So with the publication of Jon’s sudden re-appearance as a novelist (novel #1 here) ten years after his disappearance, Everett the character provides those notes and comments immediately after each chapter of Jon’s newest novel. And his comments seem enlightening, indeed. at first glance.
But as we make our way through Jon’s novel and Everett’s notes, we begin to realize that something is awry. It becomes painfully clear that Everett is obsessed with Jon and jealous of Jon’s near-rock-and-roll-star status as an author whose work is both loved and admired by critics and adored by the public. His novels are made into major motion pictures, and those are also rousing successes. Meanwhile, Everett struggles to reach that kind of success. His novels are okay but barely noticed by the general public. So he comes up with a plan: he’ll start writing mysteries. Good old traditional whodunits. Sort of like “Russian Doll,” as a matter of fact. What a coincidence! And his plan succeeds. To a degree. His mysteries are successful. He makes the kind of money he’s only dreamt of before. Life is good. But is he really happy? Can he ever truly match Jon’s successes? All doubtful.
The two novels continue chapter after chapter by Jon, each one followed by Everett’s notes — editorial statements and, more importantly, his comments about the information in each chapter. But suddenly, at the end of chapter 35, purportedly the Final Chapter of Jon’s mysterious novel, stunning literary explosions hit us right between the eyes. A new narrator; timeline changes; new chapters to Jon’s final novel; more new (or used) narrators; sudden plot twists out of the blue; new roles for previously relatively minor characters. And from here to the actual ending of “The Final Chapter,” faux endings attack us. We are confused. And our confusion is exactly the aim of C.B. Everett, the author, not the character. I am personally struck and fascinated by the whole messy picture. Everett’s goals have been shockingly accomplished.
So the title of the book is profoundly ironic. There IS no actual Final Chapter. But there is much more to say about this most unusual novel-within-a-novel. Most notable is the extreme use of the technique which was finally “officially” named in 1961, but was employed often by great and not-so-great authors long before that date: the “unreliable narrator.” Examples include Twain’s Huck Finn, who truly understands neither himself nor the characters all around him; Salinger’s Holden Caulfield; Conrad’s Charles Marlowe in “Heart of Darkness”; more recently, Everett’s (!) “James,” Huck’s story as told (brilliantly) by Huck’s slave and friend Jim. And hundreds more. But I can think of no other that offers at least two unreliable first person narrators while juggling their stories. It is, I think, a surprising and admirable feat.
And while we’re considering the use of the unreliable narrator, I should point out a couple of very different usages of that often-confusing-causing technique. The French “New Novel” author, Raymond Queneau, offered his own fascinating and funny version of it in his wonderful 1950s non-novel, “Exercises in Style.” The book features 99 versions of the same simple story, each one illustrating how that story radically changes depending on the individual author’s/teller’s style and intention. Most readers, I think, would enjoy it immensely. Still another book, this one a novel, is an even more radical example, perhaps the most famous example, of the notoriously obsessed and unreliable narrator. This one is by another French author (and film writer), Alain Robbe-Grillet, and it’s called “La Jealousie.” The, title in this case, is quite fitting. No irony involved. The protagonist who narrates the tale is a jealous man who sees his wife having a conversation with another man and is convinced they’re having an affair. But he views the conversation through the foggy lens of his obsession with their conversation and his unfortunate interpretation of their “get-together.” To compound the problem, another issue with his view is that he is also observing them through the jealousie, the window blinds that further blind him. This narrator is, in fact, a mess. But that’s all we know about him. We don’t know his name, his background, his appearance, or anything else about this unfortunate story-teller. So Robbe-Grillet labelled him the “absent narrator.” Talk about extreme! Unreliable, indeed.
There are, then, multiple examples of unreliable narrators. But two (or more) in one novel-within-a-novel is, at least as far as I know, unique. Within Everett’s novel, there is a mention of “lit-fic, ” a piece of writing that qualifies as both real literature based on expert literary observation as well as the love of the general public. Think of the efforts of Fitzgerald, Twain, Salinger, Conrad, Steinbeck. I think C.B. Everett, pen name of Martyn Waites, qualifies now as an authentic writer of lit-fic. Some readers of “The Final Chapter” will disagree. They’ll say something like, “I can’t enjoy the work of an author whose main intention is to confuse me.”
Their reaction to the novel would be similar to the reactions of traditional classical music fans when they hear and hate the music of composers like Schoenberg, Berg, Webern, and other composers of atonal music. Entirely understandable. But there is no denying those composers’ genius. Breaks from long-standing traditions are always controversial, always likely to garner responses like, “I just don’t get it. And I don’t really want to.” But I say, give “The Final Chapter” a try. Try to untangle its webs of confusion, fogginess, muddiness, and murkiness. Puzzles, after all, can be fun. And the work of C.B. Everett certainly deserves your attention. It’s a work of art.
This review was first posted on Bookreporter.com.
REVIEW BY JACK KRAMER