[Ed note: A Thousand Cuts is published under the title Rupture in the UK.]
The pivotal event in this masterful debut novel takes place in the opening pages, at first from the point of view of a 13-year-old schoolboy who was not even present when it occurred, “it” being a school shooting when a relatively newly hired teacher shot to death three students and a colleague before killing himself. An event readers may recognize in its similarity to others which have taken place around the world in the recent past with horrific frequency.
The p.o.v. switches to that of D.I. Lucia May of the CID [the only female member of that organization, a not insignificant factor in the unfolding tale], as she takes witness statements trying to come up with an explanation for the seemingly inexplicable. The shooting took place in an assembly hall where the topic of discussion was to have been Violence, and its close cousin [and something also much in the news of late], school bullying. The latter seems almost too innocuous a term for such a psyche- and soul-damaging practice, something thoroughly explored in this novel as it sheds a much-needed light on the subject.
Numerous other points of view are presented in the course of DI May’s inquiries to offer perhaps some insight and perspective into the mind-set of the killer. London’s oppressive summer heat becomes a palpable presence as she goes about the investigation, in the course of which she learns things she, and certainly her superiors, might have been better off not knowing. She, and the reader, comes to understand the desperation that culminated in the shooting. At times difficult to read, the novel will leave few untouched. Recommended.
