This is a
semi-fictionalized account of the crimes of Peter Manuel, a Scottish serial
killer who was convicted and hanged for murdering 7 people between 1956 and
1958 in Glasgow. The book’s focus is on
Manuel’s relationship with William Watt whose daughter, wife, and sister-in-law
were murdered. Watt, whom police suspected
for the triple murder, wanted to clear his name and so met with Manuel who
claimed he could locate the murder weapon and identify the murderer. The narrative alternates between the 11-hour
pub crawl the men took and Manuel’s murder trial 5 1/2 months later.
The author
excels at creating atmosphere. Gritty
descriptions of Glasgow abound: “Above
the roofs every chimney belches black smoke.
Rain drags smut down over the city like a mourning mantilla. . . . This
story happens in the old boom city, crowded, wild west, chaotic. . . . [The
city] dresses like the Irishwomen: head to toe in black, hair covered, eyes
down.” And “A train grinds slowly by
overhead. The railway tunnels are dark,
a piss-tang smell seeps in through the windows.
The coal smog is heavy and damp here, it swirls at ankle height. This dank world is peopled with tramps and
whores from Glasgow Green and clapped-out street fighters. A burning brazier lights men with fight-flattened
noses slumped against a crumbling black wall.”
Violence threatens to break out at anytime, anywhere: “It is 1958 and a husband has the legal right
to rape and beat his wife. That’s a
private matter, a matter for the home.”
Watt and
Manuel did in fact spend hours drinking together though no record of their
conversation exists. The author
speculates about what occurred during this time. The similarities between Manuel and Watt are
emphasized. Watt may not be a convicted
sex offender and hardened criminal like Manuel, but he is no innocent
either. He has his “own contacts in the
underworld” and is involved in land-development scams; “In court, Watt is asked
about extramarital dalliances and, shamefaced, admits to ‘several lapses’.” Both men lie and both are social climbers
desperate for respect; “[Manuel] aspires to be in places that are better than
he is” and “Mr. Watt likes power and being near powerful people. He likes respectability and being near
respectable people. But most of all he
likes being near powerful, respectable people.”
Both are ambitious: Watt imagines
being the president of the Merchants’ Guild and Manuel dreams of being a
published writer.
The author gives
Manuel a major flaw: he has no ability
to “anticipate what other people will be thinking about or expecting.” Watt
tells Manuel, “’You don’t see what other people think. You can’t tell. You can’t see.’” At the trial, he is anxious to demonstrate
his cleverness so he delivers a lengthy defense monologue, but “Peter Manuel
does not know how other people feel. He
has never known that. He can guess. He can read a face and see signs that tell
him if someone is frightened or laughing.
But there is no reciprocation. He
feels no small echo of what his listener is feeling.” He
thinks “the jury are as entranced by him as he is by himself. . . .He doesn’t
feel what other people are feeling.
Other people are feeling insulted and bored and revolted.”
The book
suggests that truth in a court of law is elusive. The winner in a case is the one who spins the
best tale. The word story is used about 75 times in the novel. For example, Watt’s famous lawyer, Laurence Dowdall,
is described as a “master storyteller”: “Telling
stories is his job. He’s a lawyer.” Dowdall sees winning a court case as a matter
of telling a good story: “Good
storytelling is all about what’s left in, what’s left out and the order in
which the facts are presented. Dowdall
knows how to shape a narrative, calling witnesses in the right order, emphasizing
the favourable through repeated questioning, skim-skim-skimming over the [bad].” On the other hand, Manuel loses because “He
doesn’t shape the story, seed the characters earlier and bring them on to
behave consistently. New people who have
never been mentioned before appear, cause life-changing events and then evaporate. Some characters even have placeholder names: ‘Mr.
Brown’, ‘a girl in hospital’. In Manuel’s
stories everyone is acting out of character. . . . The jury hate him, not just
because he has killed lots of people, but for telling them such a stupid story.” Certainly, the author implies that the truth
was not revealed in Samuel’s case; she implies that Glasgow reeked with corruption
and that there were others implicated in the Watt family murders.
Occasionally
the perspective of minor characters is included. My favourite was that of Brigit, Peter Samuel’s
mother, a very pious Catholic. She loves
her son but is horrified by his actions.
I cheered when she finally speaks truth to her son and “stands up
without permission from her husband or the officers or her son.” She also confronts her husband Samuel who
lied for Peter and keeps defending him: “She
looks at Samuel through her tears and thinks he is an eejit. He’s a lying, f.ing eejit and he is kinky in
the s.e.x. department. But she is
married to him. So be it. . . . ‘Don’t
you touch me ever again.’”
True crime
is not my genre, but this book was recommended as a good introduction to the
writing of Denise Mina. I did enjoy it
enough that I will probably read one of her completely fictional books.
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