Mystery

MYSTERY 

In the Name of Mercy 

By Nicholas Delbanco 

Warner Books, 1995, 310 pages 

Reviewed by Jamie Agnew 

The only problem with mysteries becoming so popular and so vital is that now everybody wants to get into the act. When "creative" writing ascended to the academic ivory tower, mainstream highbrow writers no longer felt the need to sully themselves with mundane things like plot and suspense, leaving the field open for genre writers to produce novels that were actually interesting. It's fortunate for mystery readers that the majority of mystery writers have never attended the university MFA programs that have so enervated modern fiction. 

         But now that mysteries and suspense novels dominate the best-seller lists even someone like the emperor of Michigan's MFA program, Nicholas Delbanco, has deigned to descend long enough to scoop up some loose change before returning to his airy pedantry. Evidently tired of his previous volumes beating a quick retreat to the remainder tables, Delbanco means to teach the world how to write a thriller while still maintaining his arty-farty credibility. The result is "In the Name of Mercy," a murder mystery with too much murder and not enough mystery, a medical thriller with too much medicine and not enough thrills. 

        In a good crime novel characters reveal themselves in exciting life-or-death situations, but Delbanco doesn't stoop to dramatize. Instead he lays his characters down on the page, as flat and crammed with detail as the nutritional information on the side of a cereal box. They don't interact, they're juxtaposed until they become walking, talking (and talking and talking) position papers, existing only to be knocked off at the end of their fuzzy soliloquies. The plot, when it occasionally intrudes on their thoughts, has to do with a hospice for terminal patients that has a problem with premature expiration, allowing Delbanco to frequently drop the name of a real character name Kevorkian. 

        This is junk food that's supposed to be good for you----liver Doritoes----and you can tell because you have so little desire to consume it. If you want a real literary mind taking a unique slant on the crime novel try Faulkner's "Sanctuary" or Mailer's "Tough Guys Don't Dance." If you want a great mystery in a hospital setting that features a wonderful plot, social commentary and interesting characters try Christianna Brand's 1944 gem "Green For Danger." It's only if you run out of Sominex that I'd recommend "In the Name of Mercy."