A haphazard philanderer and a thrilling lecturer who privately mocks the rubes he deigns to educate, he both awes and exasperates his daughter, who's only just beginning to extract herself from his shadow. (Her mother died in a car crash when Blue was 5.) Dad, a perpetually visiting professor, insists on traipsing from one podunk college to another, where his hands-on specialty in civil and guerrilla wars and frequent publications in small-run journals with titles like Federal Forum and the New Seattle Journal of Foreign Policy lend him a rakish mystique. "Special Topics" is narrated by Blue van Meer, the 16-year-old daughter of Gareth, a sort of itinerant policy wonk. "Special Topics," for all its overeager freshman infelicities, is a real novel, one of substance and breadth, with an arresting story and that rarest of delights, a great ending. "Beneath the foam of this exuberant debut," he writes, "is a dark, strong drink." There's certainly plenty of foam covering the surface of "Special Topics" - in the form of a strenuously antic style and the pretty thin device of titling each chapter after some famous literary work ("Othello," "Madam Bovary," etc.) and proclaiming that the whole book is a "syllabus." But get past the froth, sip a bit deeper, and he's right: The brew is surprisingly potent. She is generally fearless in the face of uncertainty, and remains calm even in the face of significant danger.The pre-publication blurb isn't one of the higher forms of literature, but Jonathan Franzen's one-sentence endorsement, printed on the back cover of Marisha Pessl's first novel, "Special Topics in Calamity Physics," is a masterpiece of sorts. She's the first to start investigating Hannah's death. Despite being uncomfortable outdoors, she agrees to go camping with her new friends. She's always seeking always right at the edge of her zones comfort and familiarity. Opinion about the main character:īlue Van Meer has the spirit and energy of a consummate explorer. Her growing distrust of dad is well-founded and Blue herself doesn't yet know just how well-founded it is.
This scene demonstrates the almost subconscious nature of Blue's precociousness. Blue becomes ill and excuses herself to the bathroom. Something about her dad's reaction seems disingenuous. As the two discuss the implications of Blue's discover, Blue grows uneasy. Best scene in story:īlue informs her father of what she's figured out regarding Hannah's death.
At the same tim, she keeps us thoroughly entertained with fast-paced action and a good dose of literary suspense.
Pessl lets the reader in on Blue's subjective experience. The action is nicely balanced with character development.
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