An apology and a dud

Hello dear readers. It's been a long time since we last chatted and I apologize; a lot of changes and revelations have come my way recently, a few of which were rather unexpected and undesired. I've been a little more than down in the dumps and think "post-grad depression" should be officially added to the DSM-IV. Times are a changin' for me and I'm struggling to balance the day to day of it all. But as old things end, new ones must arise and, in the mean time, books remain a constant comfort. Well, most books that is.

A few months ago my brother, Taylor, recommended I read The Club Dumas by Arturo Perez-Reverte. Taylor described a mystery novel brimming with demon lore, murderous bibliophiles, rare books, devil worshipers, and literary references galore. He had me at "demon lore". You see, Taylor and I share of love for Religious Studies, the good, bad, and ugly of it all; years of education from eccentric Southern Baptists, crazy Catholics, and middle of the road Presbyterians could hardly render us to be anything but curious.  

The Club Dumas revolves around an antiquarian book dealer, Lucas Corso. Corso is a greedy, chain smoking master-manipulator, who happens to be an exceptional finder and investigator of rare books. At the beginning of the novel, Corso is hired by millionaire and rare book collector, Varo Borja, to investigate Borja's copy of The Nine Doors. There are only 3 known copies of The Nine Doors and Borja wants Corso to compare his copy to the other 2 in order to determine which, if any, are forgeries. Here's the catch: The Nine Doors is said to contain clues and a formula for summoning the Devil.

Corso's quest to examine the 3 copies is plagued by deadly assassins and strange, unexplained occurrences. In Paris, he meets a girl who not only claims her name is Irene Adler (Sherlock Holmes' infamous love interest), but also alludes that she is a fallen angel. Much of the novel revolves around the mystery surrounding the girl and her and Corso's flirtation, which is only slightly intriguing at best. Corso also discovers a secret society, "The Dumas Club", to which a number of the major characters belong. The purpose of this literary society is never clearly determined, except to underline Corso's belief that Alexander Dumas (the author of The Three Musketeers) was obsessed with the occult and a closet Devil worshiper. This too is never clearly resolved. Eventually Corso's investigation reveals that all 3 copies of The Nine Doors are real and, more importantly, necessary to summon the Devil.

The film adaptation . . . kinda crappy, but it comes with eye candy.

The ending of the novel is ambiguous and unsatisfying, not to mention a tad confusing and even underwhelming. Call me crazy but when I read a novel that involves summoning the Devil, I expect a conclusion as satisfying as the lure of the plot. The story was so weighed down with miscellaneous facts that the already convoluted narrative became even more painstaking to navigate. I also just didn't like Corso. He had all the character flaws of a leading man, but none of the redeemable qualities that make him relatable or even likable. Even in the film adaptation, "The Ninth Gate",  Johnny Depp couldn't finesse Perez-Reverte's creation and that's pretty bad, right? Now, to be fair, there is some fantastic artwork and its obvious the author did an impressive amount of research, but it just wasn't enough. So even with all the promise of a good, pseudo-historical thriller, The Club Dumas fails to impress.