Suspects

April 3, 2000
Berger's 20th novel suffers from a surfeit of pages and a lack of story. There is probably enough material in this fairly straightforward murder mystery to satisfy the demands of a novella; but for a standard 256-page novel, the mystery, the characters and their histories are not nearly complex enough to sustain the narrative. To fill out the page count, far too many diluting diversions, descriptions and side stories have been introduced. The resulting concoction--described as a meditation on "friendship, family loyalty, and the American dream"--is little more than a collection of run-of-the-mill human interest stories pasted onto what could have been a fine, workmanlike whodunit set in a typical American town. In the first two-thirds of the narrative, Berger calls the motives and actions of a large portion of his dramatis personae into question; but, because of his narrative perambulations, there is very little suspense or sense of urgency. In a novel more about police than about suspects, Berger (Robert Crews, 1994, etc.) gets caught up in the inner lives of a rather large cast of cameo characters and in arguments about the good old days before notions of individual rights and accountability came along and made life difficult for cops. Too caught up, as it happens, to be able to divert his readers from the fact that his red herring is far too red to escape notice.

May 15, 1996
Murder in a small town changes the residents' perspectives in this latest from Berger (Meeting Evil, LJ 5/1/92).

May 1, 1996
Berger wrote his most acclaimed novel, "Little Big Man," over 30 years ago and now has 20 novels to his credit, but critics have been disappointed in his recent efforts, including "Robert Crews" (1993), a not so clever remake of "Robinson Crusoe," and this is his worst yet. "Suspects" is one tired, pointless, and derivative piece of work. It's, guess what, a murder mystery. And the victims are, guess who, a beautiful young mother and her pretty little girl. And one of the detectives on the case is, guess what, lonely and depressed. Heck, his name is even Moody. As the title implies, there are several possible suspects, but it's difficult to care about any of them except, vaguely, for Lloyd, the victim's husband's half-brother. Lloyd is a little guy afraid of women and unable to hold down a job. He's rescued by the only character with an ounce of energy, a young, cute trucker named Molly Sparks, and their sweetly chaste relationship is the only bright spot in this otherwise dreary exercise. Berger is running strictly on reputation here, possibly damaging it beyond repair. Buy only if demand warrants. ((Reviewed May 1, 1996))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1996, American Library Association.)