Books I Read This Month – July 2024
The Thanatos Syndrome – Walker Percy
Her Fearful Symmetry – Audrey Niffenegger
Anytime you hear about 20th century Catholic writers, Walker Percy inevitably comes up. He is the most notable Catholic writer post-Vatican 2.
Although he’s personally religious, this novel is not didactic or preachy, but it is suffused with a moral sensibility that reflects Catholic values, such as the sacredness of all life. Thanatos is the Greek personification of Death.
The book is set deep in the bayous of Louisiana, which is a different kind of Southern. Very neo-Gothic. The main character is a psychologist recently released from prison. He was charged with writing fake painkiller prescriptions to truckers.
He comes home to discover everyone in town has changed. He suspects it has something more to do than the passage of time. For one, his wife has suddenly become an expert bridge player, with a computer-like ability to calculate the hands of every player’s hands.
It’s only after restarting his practice and interacting with some old patients that he’s able to determine exactly how the townspeople have changed. The meek, doubting, self-conscious women he treated before are now brazen and sexually uninhibited. One even presents herself– rearward–in the middle of a session.
His old patients lack their old personalities, ignore context,and resemble a computer in the way they regurgitate information, just like his wife.
With the help of his cousin Lucy, a top government doctor, they uncover a criminal conspiracy that aims to change human behavior by spiking the water supply with a chemical compound.
The unlawful experiment has succeeded on most grounds, eliminating crime and anti-social behavior by 80%. But at what cost?
As they dig deeper to the heart of the conspiracy, they uncover an evil and degradation more chilling than putting something in the water.
The novel is structured and paced like a classic thriller, but engenders a philosophical dialogue about what it means to be human and the value of life.
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I’m not gonna lie–I picked up “Her Fearful Symmetry” because it was on display at the library and I liked the title. Plus, I already enjoyed “The Time Traveller’s Wife,” her other book.
Julia and Valentina are identical twins who have inherited their aunt Elspeth’s London apartment. Elspeth was their mother’s twin, but never had a relationship with her when she was alive.
Once in London, they meet the eccentric neighbors and Robert, Elspeth’s fiance. As they acclimate to their new apartment, they sense that Elspeth may still hang around. Meanwhile, Robert pores thru Elspeth’s old diaries and discovers some shocking secrets.
Nicknamed “Mouse,” Valentina strives for her own independence, separate from her twin, as the months pass by. First, she falls in romantically with Robert, and then concocts a horrifying scheme to establish her own identity.
At first, an old-fashioned ghost love story, the plot gradually takes sinister turns, with many surprising revelations along the way. Definitely worth reading, if you like horror fiction.
Easy Trouble 