Authors:
Edgar Allan Poe, Clive Barker, Mike Carey, Simon Clark, Joe R. Lansdale, Jonathan Maberry, Elizabeth Massie, Weston Ochse & Yvonne Navarro, Lisa Tuttle, Stephen Volk
Edited by Paul Kane & Charles Prepolec
What They Say
Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” introduced the world to its first literary detective, Le Chevalier C. Auguste Dupin. Now Dupin’s legacy continues in brand-new tales of ratiocination, mystery, and the macabre. Experience the further exploits of Dupin as he faces enemies both human and otherworldly; follow the adventures of his grandson, the Pinkerton detective; learn the fate of Dupin’s great-granddaughter; discover how Dupin connects with his creator, Poe, with Sherlock Holmes; and more!
The Review:
Although he is overshadowed by his younger, British brother in deduction, Le Chevalier C. Auguste Dupin was literature’s first detective. Created by Edgar Allan Poe in “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” he appeared in two other tales, “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt” and “The Purloined Letter.” Dupin was a Parisian (or at least a Frenchman) of noble birth who had fallen on hard times. He lived with another man, who served as his nameless narrator, in a rather rundown apartment in Paris and the two shared a love of books and mysteries. Like Sherlock Holmes, Dupin was a master at deduction—or ratiocination, as he called it—and used his singular ability as a consulting detective. The first story, which gives this collection its name, “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” introduces his character nicely. He solves the mystery not out of a sense of justice (although he does seem to care somewhat about the police arresting the wrong person), but because it provides an interesting challenge for his abilities. In many ways Dupin comes off as a laconic Sherlock Holmes, and that might in part explain the myriad ways he is depicted in this collection as well as why I felt that the strongest stories (with one exception) dealt with his reputation and not with his own adventures.
It may seem a bit unfair to continually compare Dupin to Holmes given that he came first, but the parallels between the two characters and the stamp that Doyle’s character has left on the genre make it nearly inescapable. Poe may have started the genre with Dupin, but Doyle ran away with it with Holmes. Dupin and Holmes are both bachelors defined as much by their setting as they are by their dedication to the science of deduction. They both lack social graces and come off as aloof, superior, and condescending, and their stories are told by their sole friends (Dr. Watson and Dupin’s nameless narrator). However, Holmes feels the more fleshed out character—quite possibly because he has the weight of numerous stories behind him and Dupin only appears in three. Dupin appears to be a machine designed for the sole purpose of deducing, whereas Holmes contains character ticks and eccentricities that hint at a barely-contained melancholy.
This is why the majority of the stories in this volume that tell stories about Dupin fall flat for me. The character, for all his literary importance, is too much of a cypher. There are hints of a backstory and just enough of a touch of Poe macabre to keep me from saying that he is a flat character, but not enough is given to make truly come alive—with the exception of Joe R. Lansdale’s “The Gruesome Affair of the Electric Blue Lightning” and Stephen Volk’s “The Purloined Face.” Dupin functions more as the vehicle through which the story happens and as such the events that transpire around him are far more interesting than the actual character. It violates one of my favorite definitions of story, “A story is something interesting happening to someone the reader has grown to care about.”
And there are some very interesting “somethings” that happen in this collection. “The Unfathomed Darkness” has Dupin and his friend encounter a zeppelin full of Scandinavian religious fanatics convinced that the Earth is diseased, and “The Vanishing Assassin” features interesting tidbits from Japanese culture and history. These were well-written stories (all of the ones in this collection were well-written, in fact), but they fell flat for me. The ones that I enjoyed the most focused on Dupin’s legacy, his relatives (often both at the same time), or featured a strong narrative voice.
“The Sons of Tammany” is an example of the latter. The story is told from the point of view of cartoonist Thomas Nast whose political cartoons helped bring down the notorious Boss Tweed. Mike Carey infuses the story with a strong narrative voice and humor which made it great fun to read.
Joe R. Lansdale’s “The Gruesome Affair of the Electric Blue Lightning” takes a different approach. The Texan forgoes his typical two-gun mojo style for Poe’s much more staid narrative voice but manages to avoid the pitfalls that typified writing of Poe’s time (excessive wordiness and exposition, mainly). The real fun lies in the plot. Poe manages to pay homage to “Rue Morgue” while at the same time bringing in Lovecraft’s Cthulu mythos, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, and the life of the German Alchemist Johan Dippel, who may have served as the model of Shelley’s titular doctor. Even aping Poe’s voice, Lansdale infuses the story with his folklorist eye and infectious energy.
Two other stories worth mentioning are Weston Ochse and Yvonne Navarro’s “The Weight of a Dead Man,” which tells the story of Dupin’s grandson, Nate Dupes, a detective for the Pinkertons, and Elizabeth Massie’s “From Darkness, Emerged, Returned,” chronicling the attempts of Dupin’s great granddaughter in solving the death of a local milkman. Ochse and Navarro craft an almost instantly appealing character in Nate Dupes and the mixture of occult and Southwestern American history made for a great read. I would actually like to see more adventures of Nate Dupes, which is always the sign of a character that has legs, so to speak. Massie’s story is more of a done-in-one affair, and it works very well. The buildup to the mystery’s solution is masterfully handled. The story leads the reader down one alley of deduction after the other, hinting at the solution and allowing the reader to believe that he/she has solved it, only to turn another direction entirely. When you finally do figure out what’s going on, it’s chilling.
I’ll close with the final story in this collection, “New Murders in the Rue Morgue” by Clive Barker. Not surprisingly, it was a highly disturbing story. Like many of the other tales in this collection, it deals more with the legacy of Dupin than the actual character. Lewis, a famous American painter, travels to Paris at the request of one his oldest friends, Phillipe. Phillipe is accused of murdering his mistress and he wants Lewis’ help because Lewis’ grandfather was Auguste Dupin. As he investigates the murder, disturbing similarities between it and the supposedly true events chronicled in “Rue Morgue” arise. It turns out that Phillipe had been so entranced by Lewis’ grandfather and that tale that he tried with his mistress to “civilize” an ape. The ape ended up killing the girl and fled to the heart of Paris, pretending that it was a man. The story deals with bestiality, murder, and the hopelessness of life. It ends with Lewis throwing himself into an icy river rather than face life anymore and the entire story was so bleak that it left a bad taste in my mouth. It’s not that it is poorly written—Barker, for all his faults, is a solid writer—but it embodies many of the worst qualities of postmodern horror. It reveals and revels in the basest aspects of humanity without offering any hope of redemption or basic decency. We are all animals, it says, just shaved beasts with pretenses of divinity. Remove those pretenses we are no better than the ape that buys prostitutes with drugs and money and kills with impunity. When the ape says Lewis’ name near the end of the story, Lewis is appalled by the sense that he and the beast are one in the same. It recognizes Lewis and acknowledges him as an equal. In this scene the ape doesn’t just say Lewis’ name—it says our name as well.
I can’t truly say that this is a bad story. At the very least it is an affective tale given that it inspired revulsion in me. I simply reject the underlying themes it presents and wish that it had not ended this volume as it provided a bitter aftertaste to what was an otherwise highly enjoyable collection of stories.
In Summary:
Beyond Rue Morgue continues the adventures of Le Chevalier C. August Dupin, the first literary detective. The lineup of writers for this volume is quite impressive, and even though some of the stories failed to engage me, it wasn’t because of the quality of the writing. It had more to do with my own tastes. Overall this was a very enjoyable collection of stories that ranged from straight-up mysteries to macabre tales of supernatural horror. Highly recommended.
Content Grade: A-
Published By: Titan Books
Release Date: July 16, 2013
MSRP: $14.95
