I originally reviewed Already Dead by Charlie Huston on September 27th, 2006
Charlie Huston’s third novel, Already Dead, is the first novel in a long time to make me lose sleep. That’s a good thing by the way. There is nothing quite like being solidly in the grip of an excellent novel. The narrator and main character Joe Pitt is cut from the classic mold of all the great PI’s except for one thing, he is a Vampyre. Forget everything you know about vampires as the tale is finally brought kicking and screaming into the 21st century and treated with modern sensibilities.
The environment that Huston creates is not only well developed but also realistic. Like Huston’s other crime novels the dialogue is tough as stone and machine-gun fast, in the tradition of the great hard-boiled novels, but also believable. Already Dead skins the dead hide of the traditional vampire story and puts a more realistic spin on the mythos that we are all so familiar with.
The Vampyre world of Already Dead is treated as a rationalized fantasy where everything is given a scientific or pseudo scientific explanation, there is only one “creature” that is left unexplained by the end. Vampires aren’t blood sucking creatures of the night they are smart organized creatures who don’t want to alert the general public to their existence and are wary of anything or anyone who will draw attention to them. The vampires on the lower end of the food chain are treated more like junkies then a mythical creature.
Not just happy to effectively combine a PI tale and Vampire story Huston audaciously adds zombies into the mix. Even these well worn character types are treated with a new understanding, creatures who suffer from a different virus but possibly a relative strain of The Vyrus. Zombies, or Shamblers, as they’re called in the book are hunted and killed by The Clans when they make an appearance because The Clans don’t want the unnecessary attention that their indiscriminate killing brings.
At times it wears its ironic sensibilities proudly as it gleefully skewers any and all conventions that the vampire mythos has from movies, books and TV shows. The characters are all self-consciously aware of all the conventions and their own “fictional” history so they take a perverse delight in poking them full of holes and have fun with the people who believe in them.
Pitt is in a relationship, he has had a girlfriend, Evie, for about two years, she doesn’t know anything about what he does or who he his. She has AIDS and is HIV positive. She refuses to have sex with him because of her disease and he’s OK with that rule. But he has full knowledge that The Vyrus is stronger than the HIV and AIDS and if he infected her that The Vyrus would scour her blood and cure her. This would of course turn her into a Vampyre. Does he watch her die or does he cure her? Only time will tell. The scenes with Evie also provide some of the more touching moments of the book.
As with the first volume of a series it tends to be introductory, historical and largely expository. But the compelling nature of the world we’re being introduced to coupled with the action packed story line make this story fully satisfying. Also in line with its first book status it asks more far reaching questions then the ones it answers and it’s the answers to those questions that are going to make me tap my sock-less foot as I anxiously await further installments. The next book should prove to be the interesting one because the larger story arcs should progress now that the exposition is out of the way. One of the strengths of the novel and the potential strength of the series is that Huston has a lot if not all of it mapped out and knows where it’s going. In fact you can go to Charlie Huston’s website and see portions of what he calls the Joe Pitt Bible, which contains character & Clan bios and some “rules” of the world. But don’t let the brevity of the book fool you, it is packed with a depth that some larger books can’t muster. Also due to the astonishing pace of the book it becomes hard to keep track of everything and like all good books it holds up to repeated readings.
Unlike other novels that purport to mix the fantastic or supernatural with the mystery novel Already Dead is a pitch perfect hard-boiled private eye tale first and a tale of the fantastic second, which isn’t to diminish the supernatural aspects, trust me they are there. This is the quality that in and of itself separates it from the pack. Most tales born of this hybrid are Fantasies told in a Mystery setting instead of a Mystery told in a Fantasy setting. It might not seem like there is much of a difference but they are in fact worlds apart. When a writer of fantasy creates the characters or worlds in which this hybrid tale is told it is often times perceived by readers of mysteries as the work of a dilettante, someone wanting only to infuse the fantasy genre with something different. But the “different” in question is in all actuality something that is commonplace, after all mystery novels, in all shapes and forms, represent a sizable portion of the market. Without much exertion one could easily name tropes and clichés of that genre as well as the icons and more popular examples.
One has to recognize that not unlike other genres the mystery genre has its own sub-genres and each of these sub-genres has its own style, tone, feel and rules. A police procedural reads NOTHING like a thriller or a cozy, nor would you want it to. So, the fantasy author in question needs to carefully choose what type of mystery story that they want to meld with their fantasy creation, and then seamlessly blend the two. This is not easy to do, especially so that EVERYONE is happy, mystery and fantasy fans alike. Often books of this nature miss more then they hit. But the interesting thing about this is that the readers aren’t always aware of the misses. If the fantasy reader isn’t aware of the false notes that the police procedural portion of the story isn’t ringing true then it doesn’t deter them from enjoying the fantasy story at hand which is still different from other fantasy tales out there, which again was probably the point.
However, when a tale is crafted though that rings true on all counts, both fantasy and mystery, then what you have in your hands is not regarded as a novelty but instead a rarity and a classic as well. Already Dead is just such a book. You could easily hand the book to a mystery fan and they would recognize and claim it as one of their own, now it would be prudent to recognize Huston’s pedigree in the genre, namely the now completed Hank Thompson trilogy, though that alone wouldn’t facilitate the allegiance. You could also give the book to a fantasy or horror fan and they too would claim it as one of their own. Perhaps the most important thing for just such a work would be that they would all be correct.
In recent years, under various names, there has been a new breed of fiction published. Cross pollinating freely among the genres to create something new. Already Dead is not only a perfect example of what can be accomplished with this technique but it also serves as a picture perfect example of the down side of cross genre writing. It SHOULD appeal to fans of dark fantasy, fantasy, horror, science fiction, PI and noir. But it fell through the cracks and nobody read it. It got a nominal amount of press in mystery circles based on Huston’s Hank Thompson trilogy, but in other genre circles, not much. I’m familiar with the praise surrounding George R R Martins Song of Ice and Fire series and Steven Erikson’s Book of the Fallen series and others, and that praise IS deserving but don’t miss out on this opportunity to start reading what could, when all is said and done, wind up being one of the great series of the decade. It should serve as an interesting counter point to those two series for a purely aesthetic reason, the total page count of the 5 book series will probably be around 1300 pages whereas Martins books average a little over 800 pages PER VOLUME.
