The Madness of Crowds: Book Review

I just finished reading The Madness of Crowds by Louise Penny. This is a mystery/thriller novel  in a larger series called Three Pines. Inspector Armand Gamache is at the center of the story, a man of principle and character, who lives in the titular tight-knit community. In this particular entry, he is asked by an old friend to run security for a speaker who proves to be particularly controversial. From there, the story explodes, as people begin to react to the speaker's presence and message in volatile ways, leading to a body, as you can imagine.

Overall (No Spoilers)

This was meant to be a quick and simple read for me. But it turned out that it really wasn't. The story was getting on my nerves from the outset for writing craft reasons; then, it started to show moralistic tinges that rubbed me in the wrong way. Instead of the quick read, I got over-analytical, and it took way too long to get through. This is probably because I read it rather than listened, but I wanted to get a feel of the prose, so I guess I was kind of asking for it.

In any case, let me catch myself before I go off on a rant.

Strides

Lore

I think the lore of the series overall was among the more powerful aspects of the read. This is technically the seventeenth entry in the series. I can get away with reading this out of order, though, given that this is similar to CSI or Jack Reacher and the other mystery thriller series' out there. There is some continuity over time, but the stories are meant to be standalone.

This mixture of continuity and episodic storytelling allows for this feeling of a world that is far larger than the story being told. Sprinkled throughout this book is character backstory, references, and even inside jokes that all refer to these prior entries. In spite of all my issues with the book, I did have some desire to read the rest of the series to dig into some of this lore that I keep hearing about in the background.

This has really interesting connections to lore in fantasy, in a way.

All this said, I won't be reading another of her books.

Theme Potential

I was not entirely sure what I was expecting when I came into this story. The reason I picked it up is because the description mentioned something about a controversial speaker during the time of the virus. I liked the sound of that, so I wanted to see the kinds of ideas the book would engage with. At the same time, the book is also a mass market mystery, so I was not expecting a deep exploration that would shatter my mind.

The end result is a little mixed, though I will give it a little leeway because of the latter point. The book is a mystery, so I'm not expecting the story to unpack a deep discussion about the nature of morality, and whatnot.

As it turns out, the book does actually have some mature commentary about the subject matter. Because we are talking about a story, the characters naturally have a personal connection to the controversy. Specifically, it asks about whether mentally disabled children should be aborted. They have a child with Downs Syndrome, and it gives the readers very memorable conversations about parentage and "burdens." These ideas are important, they are nigh on impossible to discuss, and I genuinely was impressed with how it was handled, at least overall.

To be sure, the question could have been unpacked further with deeper discussions on ethics. Peter Singer comes to mind. But this novel is just a mystery and philosophy is an endless abyss. Utilitarianism is a good example of that, in a way.

One thing I have to mention is that I am reading the book We Need To Talk About Kevin. I swear, shortly after all this mature discussion, I read the best (worst) timed chapter in that book. The mother got her child screened for Downs Syndrome because there was no way was going to have an "imbecile" for a child at her age. The mother's character in general was so insensitive, I swear I lost it.

Alright, I'll stop.

Stumbles

Themes and Moralizing

While I thought there were interesting discussions about the themes in the book, there were also ways in which the themes were mucked up with annoying moral outrage and simplicity that I would have hoped would be avoided in a story like this.

The book heaps on moral outrage that I found to be annoying, because it interfered with my desire to think about the topic that was being broached. In retrospect, this is kind of my fault given how little focus the actual topic had, but my mind was going wild with the discussions surrounding it, and I just wanted more exploration and a more interesting unpacking of the character proposing the idea. In the end, I didn't really get that.

Behind the Veil

There were parts in the story where I thought it was too easy to see behind the veil. By this, I mean, there were parts where the book explicitly talked about conflict of interest, and I just laughed. I can read a mystery with investigators that are emotionally invested, I can read mysteries where investigators are technically suspects, but once they start talking about other conflicts of interests that are so banal in comparison I just can't take it seriously any more.

On a somewhat related note, I remember one bafflingly stupid conversation between two of the characters where one calls the other out over their bias, and the response was with such overt moral outrage that it made me laugh. I'm supposed to think of these characters as morally righteous, and all I was thinking was "conflict of interest," which they were then selectively acknowledging, themselves.

Awkward Flipper

There was one side plot I thought was affixed to the story well in the latter half, but not in the front half. The problem is that I thought that the characters in the front half seemed to take for granted that the side plot had something to do with the investigation, when it didn't at the time. I get that it was all going to come together, but it still felt awkward at the time. There was this weird conversation about the side plot, where they drew a metaphorical connection to investigation, though the execution itself made the whole conversations come off as confusing and weird. It was not until afterward that I really got the point.

The Mystery

As I was reading the story, I was actually beginning to become impressed with how the story was unfolding. There were a fair amount of variables to account for. There were events in the past and the present, and I was actually excited to see it all come together. Until recently, I had fallen into this annoyed state of disillusionment with mystery, where the story is just contrived to be tricky for its own sake, rather than to say anything interesting thematically or at least do anything competent.

Unfortunately, this book has not really changed my thoughts on anything. All my hopes had been built up for nothing. Thematically, I will admit those who like stories of principled people standing strong will enjoy this (and it looks like they did). Other than that, this was a mess.

It turns out, all of the complexity was fog to create an illusion of a mystery. That is really the only way I think I can describe this. I'm simply imagining this sea of complexity that I'm trying to sort into a picture, only for it all to drain away to a dotted-line picture made of five dots, or something. All of the pieces that I was trying to fit into the puzzle were just red herrings that were never relevant in the first place. Penny "salvaged" them at the end by making them thematically relevant, which is just stupid in the context of a mystery. They were suspects. And some weren't even involved in the events in question in the barest manner possible. So, I guess the reveal is that they were never actually suspects at all, or something. That's what it felt like. Quite literally, I was just asking, "why the hell is this character here?"

The actual reveal was also incredibly banal and obvious, in its own way. The only thing that was intriguing was why I didn't question the possibility of this conclusion sooner, which ultimately came down to the conviction that something more complex was going down. I was just convinced that these added elements were there to create something interesting, when the result was just this simple thread.

There was nothing complex about the themes in the story, in the end, either. How the mystery tied up with the academic and their message and moral of the story was moralistic and annoying, and I just rolled my eyes.

The Strategy

The authorial thumb was a bit too obvious for me in a few places. And I'm not talking about cutscenes or witholding character thoughts in limited capacity here and there. There are parts where the characters come across a letter and start reasoning and arguing about the letter, breaking it down, but the reader never actually sees the content for itself. It becomes obvious after this happens several times that Penny doesn't want the reader to get ahead of the characters. Having such intricate discussions about something I can't even see for myself is just annoying, and knowing this is to contrive the mystery is also annoying. Of course, that's how stories work, yes, but this was a little too far.

There were also a little too many, "sit around and talk about the evidence" scenes. They can be fun near the end of a story, when the evidence has piled up and things needed unpacked, but these scenes were basically a fallback, happening over and over again, and so many of them went nowhere. It was infuriating. I was actually reminded of when I first started out as a writer. I would often blank out and wonder what I should write, so I would throw in an action scene or something. This is the mystery novel equivalent of that. There needs to be a purpose to all scenes, yes, even these scenes, and they had no purpose other than to spin wheels and make the mystery seem more complex than it actually was.

Compare

I read John Grisham when I was younger, and I still have many memories of The Firm, The Runaway Jury, The Pelican Brief and more. I remember his ability to create strong themes/motifs for specific books, like smoking in the second book, that just bled off the page. It helped create character that brought the whole experience to life. But that was years ago.

More recently, I read Lee Child's Reacher, which was fun. It leaned a bit too hard into the male power fantasy, but I'm still a man, so take how you will. I also read Gillian Flynn, who's command of atmosphere and character is great, though her plot is pretty lacking.

This book is definitely my least favorite of the bunch. The mystery itself was just incompetent and stupid. The complexity and intrigue built up over time was just an illusion at the end.

Conclusion

Overall, I did not like this book. I will give this a 2/10.

Video: https://youtu.be/T7R2kCNE2PA