Tournament of Books Round One - HILL WILLIAM by Scott McClanahan vs. THE LUMINARIES by Eleanor Catton

At the previous round, on Monday, I had not yet started THE LUMINARIES. I read HILL WILLIAM a week prior; I ordered it from Amazon and finished it in about an hour and a half. I had three days to read THE LUMINARIES, and I managed it, but just barely--as you can see by the lateness of this post. I think it speaks highly of THE LUMINARIES that it held my attention and continuously entreated me to keep reading it, these past three days--it's a remarkably well-wrought story, with an intriguing, vast, complex plot. In some ways, it's a mystery, with a man who has disappeared, fortunes that have been stolen, a man who has died under suspicious circumstances, illegitimate children, ladies of the night, and opium dens. It's a very interesting piece of historical fiction about an era and circumstances which I had literally never before considered, the gold rush in New Zealand. It contains some elements of the supernatural; Anna and Emery are in a sense in spiritual possession of each other's bodies, a fact made most evident by Anna's sudden acquisition of literacy, a scene that gave me actual goosebumps.

It's an incredibly cinematic novel--each scene is self-contained, and the fadings in and out between characters' perspectives have the steady ebb and flow and persistence of a tide of narrative. There is a character for every temperament to champion, and excellent intertwined parables of crime and punishment, the distinction between honesty and loyalty, morality and respectability, artifice and artlessness, addiction and abstention.

HILL WILLIAM, by contrast, has a small cast of small-minded characters who behave inscrutably and abominably. It seems as though McClanahan writes his characters solely to provoke. Their motivations are insensible and their insights as simplistic as the example given in the ToB judgment--the hills are either graves or pregnant bellies? The hills, in McClanahan's Appalachia, are being razed for profit, and a dead infant is being mourned as though it were still alive in the hospital. Neither graves nor babies seem to hold much reverence for the narrator. I don't mean to disparage "shock fiction", to purloin a term--I love Chuck Palahniuk, I love Ryu Murakami, I love Irvine Welsh. McClanahan's shock just seems lazy, in a way. There's something darkly funny about his homophobic characters' actions, and something just inarticulate about the vague intimations of sexual abuse suffered by many.

There is nothing at all inarticulate about any of Eleanor Catton's characters, even those for whom English is not quite a mastered skill. I would read THE LUMINARIES again, all its hundreds of pages. I already can't bother to give HILL WILLIAM a second thought.

My winner: THE LUMINARIES.
ToB round winner: HILL WILLIAM. Maybe I will have to look it over again.

I'm zero for two, guys. Holding out hope for the Zombie round.

Read the ToB round judgment here.