What I learned reading Night Film

**I am not a book reviewer. I am a writer. I'm not pretending to be a reviewer or have affiliates incentivizing me to talk about these books, series, podcasts, etc. I am consuming these materials to learn more about storytelling and the craft of writing. Not a review and could contain spoilers.**

Allow me to explain, because I worry that people have an expectation that I have some type of secret knowledge of what is hip and happening in the world of mysteries, noirs, and books. I don’t. Take for the fact that I used the words hip and happening, like I am an old beat poet, as a clue that I am not on the cusp of what is popular. 

I like old things.

I like old music. I like old movies. I like old TV series. I like old books. 

It actually has more to do with my skepticism than anything. I'm always skeptical when something is incredibly popular. Almost anytime something is incredibly popular, it is almost always quickly abandoned as soon as the ride is over. Sometimes never spoken of again. I don’t want to waste my time on something that’s disposable. I’m not an early adopter. In fact, I am so much of a late adopter that something I do not get into something until it’s time for the second go-round of it’s popularity.

My husband is the opposite. He only wants to see what’s new when it comes to his media. He likes knowing what others are talking about and likes to be caught up on the series that have everyone’s attention. He believes in the “take” economy which keeps recap and show discussion podcasts thriving. He can’t enjoy social media if he is waiting on his slow-ass wife to watch that week’s episode with him. 

But me, I like waiting until I’m ready.

I was finally ready to read Night Film by Marisha Pessl this summer despite the fact that it had been sitting on my shelf for at least a year. And this was a purchase made well after it’s initial release. I knew I wanted to read it as soon as I scanned the back cover, but I also knew that I was not in a position to consume an almost 600 page novel. It's not quite the door-stoppers like books such as Anna Karenina, The Goldfinch, or Dune. But I knew I was going to have to commit to finishing it. Reading a thicc book – yes, I spelled it that way for a reason – fills me with a feeling of accomplishment.

But it all came together because I knew I was going to boarding a few flights this summer. I like reading on planes. Also, summer is when I read horror. I'm a summer-ween girly when it comes to books. I like the safety of the sunshine and beach views – although I'm aware that there are many terrifying books with a sunny locale. I’ll read those in the winter or fall.

Here is what I learned by reading Night Film.

– I don’t know if I want to be a writer that includes supplemental materials. 

The detective in this novel – an investigative journalist – rightfully searches online for information. In this novel there are not descriptions of what he is reading but the actual articles with artwork, photographs and web domains. This is an incredible feat because often writers will not go so far as to write fake internet articles for their novel. That is an incredible level of detail. Many readers love these supplements and comment on how this type of material makes the novel feel more interactive and real. House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski uses charts and graphs to explain the mystery in his novel, and the readers went nuts for it. At first I was intrigued when I would come across those articles in the novel, and other times I felt like including the whole article slowed me down. This is merely a matter of taste. Also, the photos of the women they are pursuing looked a little CGI. For me, describing someone as being enigmatic and ethereal allows me to imagine what that looks like for me and no matter what photo someone shows me, unless it’s what I have envisioned myself, it will always be a let down. 

– I love seeing the band come together. Or the Avengers, or whatever your reference is. Seeing people become part of an investigative team along the way is always exciting because at first, you don’t know whether the investigative characters can trust them, which is essential for noir. It allows skepticism and doubt about their intentions, which also provides opportunities for twists and turns. In Night Film, one of the team is a young man who by all accounts seems to have fallen in love with the woman they are pursuing. It was a tension point which allowed my brain to speculate on it’s own – did he help her disappear? Is he intentionally hindering the investigation? Is he using the rest of the team so he can find her and hurt her or help her flee again? Seeing the investigative team (the band) come together is almost as exciting as seeing the band come back together in a future project. Those of you watching the latest season of The Bear might be feeling my joy there.

– It blends mystery and horror together well. While I say I enjoy a horror novel, it’s more of the deranged killer as opposed to the monsters, zombies, or otherworldly creatures. I love a haunted house, but I prefer to read them like psychological thrillers as opposed to straight hauntings. Shirley Jackson is one of my favorite authors for that reason. With Night Film, I got the best of both worlds because it is a noir that is looking for the daughter of a reclusive, deranged, and terrifying horror film director. It touches on curses, cults, obsessions, toxic work environments, and claustrophobic spaces. The question of why this woman disappeared could be answered using psychology or an exorcist. Is her disappearance the result of a curse, an addiction, an obsession, or the desire to be rid of a controlling parent? That is a great tension and a fine line to walk.

– It’s the Scoobies that make the tension work. You never want to cast a book with cliche characters, but a mystery or horror genre demands Scoobies. The Scoobies are the member of the team who investigate the mystery – coined by the recappers at Television Without Pity about the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer referencing Scooby Doo. This Scooby team had a realist, a dreamer, and a nihilist. The realist would call bullsh*t on the mystical while the dreamer would logically state that we don’t know everything and that makes anything possible. The nihilist would point out that the argument was irrelevant because it was not getting them closer to solving the case. That’s the balance, right? I think crime fighting teams need to be more than a duo because the third person is the tie breaker. However, any more than that and you have an ensemble and ensembles are harder to write. The mystery I’m working on now is a two-person team that will eventually become a three-person team, and I am already excited to get those people together in a room.

This whole month I will be writing about what I have been consuming and how I can apply what I think works to what I am writing at the moment.

If you want to see some classic takes, check out everything I learned by reading gothics.

Don't forget the brandibradley.com store is always open. It's now offering print copies of the short, short prequel to Pretty Girls Get Away With Murder titled Local Monsters.

Local Monsters - A Southern Noir

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