John Connolly may be my Maine man, but in this book Charlie 'Bird' Parker travels south, and the result is a ghost story that carries enough overtones of modern prejudice, corruption, and violence to be called gothic noir. Every Dark Thing began in New York City and ended in New Orleans, with more than a hint of the same supernatural atmosphere that is so strong, and so effective in this novel. In between, Parker became a 'homing Bird', resettling in Maine, oblivious to the inevitable Stephen King analogies which followed. But Connolly is up to something different: he plays distinctly with classical sources, more subtly with each book, as if to prove that the elements of great literature in the past are no different today, even when they appear in so-called 'genre' fiction.
Hence, The White Road can take its well-earned place with works as disparate as Shiel and Faulkner. It's a heady mix.
The story itself moves fluidly and well, with the gap between supernatural horror and modern reality never so narrow. The world of right-wing fundamentalist fanatics is a seventh circle of hell in itself, and by relating them to the pasts of both of Parker's sidekicks, Angel and Louis, the villainy acquires an intensity that echoes the main story. And it all comes back to another Faulkner, Aaron, the evil at the centre of his last novel The Killing Kind. A cross between Hannibal Lecter and the Reverend Dimmesdale of The Scarlet Letter, Faulkner was one of the finest foils any detective has faced in many years, I hope I don't give too much away when I say I wished he'd been even more involved in this book before a sudden, unexpected chain of events brings closure, as they say, to his relationship with Bird. Still, in Maine a man's gotta do… Connolly has taken himself to a new level with this book, and that's high praise indeed.
