The Falls

When Detective Inspector John Rebus and DC Siobhan Clarke investigate the case of a missing college student, they find themselves being toyed with by an anonymous email quiz-master who may be a killer. This BBC Radio production demonstrates the possibilities of effective audio drama. From the opening scene, the listener is cast into the middle of the action. The chatter of a press conference, discussions in the police station, and walks through the streets of Edinburgh are real experiences that surround the listener. Ron Donachie performs well, but he sounds a bit too healthy and even-tempered for Rebus. S.E.S. (c) AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine


Anna Fields's skilled voice creates Niagara Falls as a living and unforgiving character, echoing and resonating in this family story. Opening with a startling courtship and marriage, Fields brings the characters and environment to life, building to a crescendo as powerful as the Falls themselves. (It's awesome to realize that a human voice can make so real the men, women, and children of this saga.) Be prepared for emotional moments as the story peaks, ebbs, and peaks again, and love is found in the most surprising places. In the end, you'll feel you know these people and share their sorrows and occasional joys. L.C. (c) AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine

Starred review from July 5, 2004
Oates is not only on her authentically rendered home ground in this sprawling novel set in the city of Niagara Falls during the 1950s, she is also writing at the top of her form. Her febrile prose is especially appropriate to a story as turbulent as the tumultuous waters that have claimed many lives over the years. Widowed on her wedding night when her new husband, a young minister and latent homosexual, throws himself into the falls, Ariah Littrell, the plain, awkward daughter of a minister, henceforth considers herself damned. Her bleak future becomes miraculously bright when Dirk Burnaby, a handsome, wealthy bon vivant with an altruistic heart, falls in love with the media-dubbed Widow-Bride. Their rapturous happiness is shadowed only by Ariah's illogical conviction over the years that Dirk will leave her and their three children someday. Her unreasonable fear becomes self-fulfilling when her increasingly unstable behavior, combined with Dirk's obsessed but chaste involvement with Nina Olshaker, a young mother who enlists his help in alerting the city fathers to the pestilential conditions in the area later to be known as Love Canal, opens a chasm in their marriage. His gentle heart inspired by a need for justice, Dirk takes on the powerful, corrupt politicians, his former peers and pals, in a disastrous lawsuit that ruins him socially and financially and results in his death. Oates adroitly addresses the material of this "first" class action lawsuit and makes the story fresh and immediate. "In the end, all drama is about family," a character muses, and while the narrative occasionally lapses into melodrama in elucidating this theme, Oates spins a haunting story in which nature and humans are equally rapacious and self-destructive. Agent, Jane Hawkins.
Author tour.
(Sept. 16)

Forecast:
This is likely to be one of Oates's biggest sellers—its heft, striking setting
and sheer
excellence should make it her highest-profile novel since
Blonde.