'The Ignorance of Blood' by Robert Wilson

That said, however, Wilson has his problems with "The Ignorance of Blood." Admittedly, he has an almost manic gift for layering his plots and maneuvering them toward satisfying, occasionally surprising, interconnections. But he has to lay a lot of pipe to make that happen, and it's often pretty dull work. Then there's the question of his manner. As a stylist, he is more stolid than witty, and you find yourself yearning -- fruitlessly -- for a cynical, enlivening wisecrack. Wilson is essentially a realist, all too often given to a fully detailed reporting of the cops discussing the enigmas of their case or planning their next move. The same is sometimes true when they're interviewing witnesses or confronting a possible perp. These scenes bulk up the book, and slow it down. There's much to be said for the brisk summary in crime novels, especially when wordy encounters do not help to particularize the minor characters. I had some difficulty telling one member of Falcon's detective team from another, or keeping straight the uniformly brutal mafiosi who drift in and out of the action.

Finally, there's the matter of brutality to consider. If a writer is committed to realism, that means that when blood is shed, there is an obligation to detail the pattern of its spattering. If a minor, but pivotal, character is going to be cut up with a chain saw, we're going to see it and feel it with discomfiting force. Come to think of it, maybe that's what Wilson's title means; there is something ignorant about this flow of gore. I'm not arguing for a return to Agatha Christie gentility -- the blood-free corpse in the library and all that. I am saying, though, that realism has its traps and that even a writer as intelligent as Wilson can be forced into them almost against his will.

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Stylized writing

We all know that mysteries and thrillers are highly stylized forms. They all proceed toward an inevitable (and satisfying) conclusion in which a temporary state of criminal disorder is soothed and a state of order is restored to the little universe the book has explored. I would argue, however, that, at its best, the forms are also stylish. The fugal wisecracking of Elmore Leonard, the noirish elegance with which wartime Europe is rendered by Alan Furst, the gnarly moral landscapes of Greeneland are all attempts to transcend mere plotting as the main element that keeps us reading.

Robert Wilson is a plain-spoken, quite competent writer who has found in Spain a novel setting for his stories, which he renders in an attractive way. There is no reason not to pass a few idle hours with one of his books. Just do not expect to be jolted out of your semi-languorous state by a memorable metaphor or an arresting moral diversion.