It’s not hard to pick the motive of the murder of a priest and his subsequent castration in John Banville’s SNOW.
Set during a particularly harsh winter in 1957 Ireland, the incident was probably more shocking and the motive more muddied, but even then, suspicion of pedophile priests was an open secret, although publicly suppressed by the Catholic Church.
The murder and mutilation occurs in an upper class Protestant home and the detective assigned the investigation, St John Strafford is also a Protestant.
The rock spider priest was somewhat of a social climber and did not discriminate by denomination when it came to his abomination.
Banville’s detective, Strafford, is a fascinating creation – “his strongest drive was curiosity, the simple wish to know, to be let in on what was hidden from others. Everything to him had the aspect of a cipher. Life was a mundane mystery, the clues the solving of which were strewn all about, concealed or, far more fascinatingly, hidden in plain view, for all to see but for him alone to recognise.”
He has hit on a version of himself that he prefers, or that will do, for the present…until something more plausible comes along.
SNOW is rich in pleasures in both sense of place and people. Like the substance of its title, SNOW throws a chilly blanket over dark and desperate deeds, the crisp narrative thawing the secrets and the mystery. Snow looks like picture postcard storybook stuff but in reality it’s icily treacherous and so the title takes on a metaphoric mantle as well.
SNOW is theatrically rich in characters: the poetry-quoting publican/butcher, the to the Manor Born Colonel straight from central casting, his fey younger wife, his scandalous daughter, a slightly sinister doctor who assiduously calls on Mrs Osborne, her ne’er-do-well drunken brother, the local alcoholic police chief mourning his suicided son, the caravan dwelling, suitably unstable stable boy, and the fetching barmaid who gives Strafford an unexpected Christmas box.
A chilling set piece in SNOW is the detective’s audience with the diocese’s Archbishop, Doctor McQuaid, described by Strafford’s superior as “Comrade Stalin’s right hand man Mr. Beria will never be dead while His Grace is alive.”
“Some things are too big to be suppressed.”, expresses the cop to the cleric.
“Suppressed. Now that is a word that troubles me, I have to say.”
“Then may I ask for a better one, your grace?”
“Withheld, I think, might be more accurate, and certainly more advisable, in this context.”
The conversation continues with veiled threats, disguised as thinly as a communion wafer. No mistaking the undertone of menace in the prelate’s calculated politeness, his subtle insinuations meant to intimidate the investigator.
SNOW is a superlative whodunnit, exquisitely executed, satisfying as a stand alone, yet leaves you yearning that further investigations by Detective Inspector St John Strafford will follow.
SNOW by John Banville is published by Faber