The Unknown Work

The unknown work is a type of courtroom drama. The first evidence of this occurs on page 14: “The carnival began where the elevator doors opened onto the courthouse’s third-floor lobby. Cameras and lights and reporters and microphones. Technicians laying cable along the floor, covering it carefully with silver duct tape.” Here is the courthouse, primed for a scandalous trial. This creates the image of all the trappings that typically go with a courtroom drama. There’s a description of the fervent photographers, the hullabaloo of all the things that go with an inevitable media frenzy, which could potentially incite violence. 

What is interesting is the build up within this prologue. One would think that there would be enough room within a story to characterize the main players as things are happening and so there is a question as to why this prologue exists or if it is even valid. There is no question that it creates a building anticipation, but it does so in such a hyperbolic way that it is difficult to take seriously. We have a full page and a half that describes how Oregon is beautiful, specifically Springfield and Eugene. But then Springfield and Eugene are pitted against one another in a country-mouse/city-mouse fashion. And then after this, the two places are described again as beautiful in their own way and operating in a type of harmony where some people live in Eugene and work in Springfield, and others choose to do the exact opposite. This strange waffling on the setting description (or the description of the ambiance of the setting) feels out of place like it can’t make up its mind. The only way this introduction would appear to be justified would be if these descriptions of Eugene and Springfield are somehow going to come back into play later in this book as human characters—that is to say, there will be two sisters, one who is sophisticated, one who is a bit hick-ish. A perfect example of this characterization of towns can be found on page 13: “Springfield, half Eugene’size, is the sister who never graduated from high school, who works for Weyerhaeuser or Georgia-Pacific, and no longer notices the acrid smell.” From this description, we know that the two sisters will be beautiful, but they will also be against each other in some way because they are so diametrically opposite from one another. Of course, if we’re using this scenery description as a plot augury, the sisters will duke it out over something, but eventually come to realize that they love each other enough to overcome their differences. This is evidenced on page 14: “The dipping, curving Belt Line freeway connects Eugene and Springfield, and their boundaries merge into one another.” The text seems to be saying, It’s a long and winding road, but they’ll get there. Trying to make this connection with a foreshadowed description of different parts of Oregon is awkward and heavy-handed, but it is at least a somewhat decent attempt by the author to tie things together so they make sense (at least in the realm of figurative language connections and their interactions with the plot). The way this setting is written does not seem to suggest any other type of author intention beside the one just proposed. 

Moving further into the story, the author sets up that a figurative storm had been brewing with the phrase: “It was ironic that it should be May again. Four seasons had come and gone since it happened.” The author has juxtaposed the pleasant-yet-dichotomous imagery of Oregon from her first page against this unknown “it,” so of course the reader’s immediate questions is to ask what “it” is. This buys the author a bit of time to let the reader stew and to explore other things. And so the author meanders into the mind of ADA Fred Hugi. The first thing we learn about the trial is not through exposition but through the stress of Fred. He’s been working on this for a year. His wife is alienated, he’s freaking out, and all of these details point strongly to an authorial intention to tell the reader that this trial is serious business.

While the exploration into Fred’s world was helpful in getting the appropriate concern level set up, it also seemed strangely gossipy and self-aggrandizing. A lot of attention is paid to Fred’s looks—he’s not that special, but there’s something about him. And the description of every other character besides Fred seems incidental as if it slipped in by accident. There are three consecutive paragraphs on page 18 that start with “Hugi” (Fred’s last name). This strong focus that is not adulterated with anything else makes the voice of the author seem as if she is star-crossed for Fred—and obsessive 13 year old with Fred’s Teen Beat posters on her wall. This style choice seems baffling and can seemingly only be attributed to two possible causes. First, perhaps the author was attempting to mimic the style of the noir detective literature greats (Hammett, Chandler) and talk up the main character so that he reaches archetypal good-guy status to the Nth degree. That is an acceptable thing to try for, and one might even suggest that the evidence for this lies on page 15: “Few eyes lingered long on Fred Hugi, the lone assistant district attorney who would be prosecuting this case for the state…Tall, lean (or downright skinny, depending…) tough as a whipcord, he wore a mustache that gave him the look of a man from another, earlier century—some frontier lawman or judge, maybe, peering solemnly from a browning tintype.” The quote is clearly describing Wyatt Earp. The second option for this strange effect is that the text becomes more salacious this way. The author is telling the reader that Fred is far too cool for school, even if people don’t recognize it. This would be an attempt to connect the main character with the reader since every person alive has experienced a time where they were misunderstood and in the right and nobody got it. Putting Fred through the same paces and then showing that he is ok with dealing with those kinds of consequences makes him a character to look up to by people who have been beleaguered by life. 

Ultimately there is a general failing in tone within this prologue because it flips and jumps around in a confused manner. There are many examples of intentional flip-flopping in literature, but here is it done poorly and so feels like a mistake—Oregon is beautiful; then parts of it are stinking, ignorant embarrassments; then none of that matters because “it” happened; then there’s a major trial; but who cares about that because Fred’s here. It’s like listening to a scratched up record. There’s no unity and cohesion. Even if the author's intention is to be off-putting in order to create chaos or anxiety in the reader, they failed: for that was not what occurred.

In reading this prologue, it reminded me a lot of Ann Rule’s The Stranger Beside Me. The story was interesting but felt fractured, like it was unclear exactly what part of the story the author wanted to start with first, creating a mediocre piece of literature with his writing. Instead of choosing, there are little placeholders peppered around so that a sort of panoramic sense of vagueness materializes in the mind of the reader. There was also a sense of educated yet colloquial familiarity to the style of writing that made it comfortable to read as if one’s friend was telling them a story.