The wounds she suffered in her fall, the break of her bones and the wreck of her organs, the haphazard spill of her blood in the dirt, have told us this much.
“This is what we know, those of us who can speak to tell a story: Lexy didn’t jump. There are many great build-ups, but too many of them fall flat, not from Parkhurst’s writing skill, but from the elements of her story. There are psychics and hotlines and messages scratched on collars, I appreciate the concept but the effect falls short. Like in a bad horror film where the main character skips blissfully unaware past fatal warning signs - you want to yell, “She’s nuts, Paul - and you’re not too bright!” Without giving too much away, his wife was no stranger to suicide and she wore the mask of a dead woman during sex - details related only in that they are two of many writings on the wall that Paul impossibly failed to see. A more intriguing mystery is why Paul cares. If he can get the dog to talk, she can tell him whether his wife jumped or fell, which isn’t much of a mystery, but boy those books she rearranged are. But after her death he becomes obsessed with getting Lexy’s dog, the only witness, to talk. She’s crazy from the beginning, he’s supposed to be sensible. Lexy, the tragically nutty heroine makes masks of dead people. She throws in all the ingredients of an Isabel Allende story - foggy nights, a dream journal, old folklore - but it doesn’t blend. Parkhurst flirts awkwardly with magical realism.
First, though, he has to learn the ropes from some shady characters who also make dogs talk, but with gruesome tactics. Luckily their dog saw the whole thing, and her husband is a linguist so he can teach the dog to talk. The police rule it an accident, but her husband doesn’t buy it. The plot goes something like this: a woman falls out of a tree in her yard and dies. I had to put it down several times, myself, and try to figure out what to do with it.
I’ve seen it in the “Staff Recommendations” sections of three different bookstores and Anna Quindlen said “I read it without stopping, and loved it completely”.
Esquire, last year, said her book was “one of 34 reasons to be optimistic about 2003”. Book magazine calls her “one of the new writers to watch”. The Dogs of Babel is Parkhurst’s first novel, and getting quite a lot of attention. who wants to rouse ’em?”įrom the sweeping biblical reference in the title to a mystery-solving message hidden on book spines, Carolyn Parkhurst’s confusing compilation of symbolism and plot turn will leave you, well, scratching your head.
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