All the Flowers Are Dying by Lawrence Block
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

"His loins stir at the thought of what he'll do to her when the time comes. [...] oh, Christ, how he wants to kill her! He doesn't want to wait. He wants to kill her right now."

Not my favorite Matt Scudder novel (this would most likely be When the Sacred Ginmill Closes ) but I think readers may find Lawrence Block's All the Flowers are Dying (2005) captivating and satisfying. The novel has one of the most intriguing setups that I have ever encountered, and what's more, the promising setup is not "wasted" in the further parts of the book, as it is wont to happen in most thrillers, but instead grows into a consistent (if implausible) plot.

Matt Scudder is hired by a woman to find out background information on her date, whom she does not yet completely trust. Meanwhile, during an AA meeting, Mr. Scudder learns about the case of Preston Applewhite, a convicted sex murderer who tortured and killed three little boys and is about to be executed. The body of one of the boys has not been found, and Applewhite does not reveal the burial place, vehemently denying that he had anything to do with the crime.

In a parallel thread of the plot (written in the third person, in italics, ugh), the reader meets a psychologist who visits Applewhite four days before the execution. He tells the convict that he believes in his innocence, which may be a ruse to discover the location of the body. Yet very soon the reader begins to suspect that the psychologist is not who he claims to be; maybe he knows in fact that an innocent man is to be executed. But enough of the synopsis.

There are many twists in the enthralling plot, some clever and others preposterous. Alas, a few scenes in the later part of the novel are quite implausible: for instance, imagine two city detectives deliberating the case in the Scudders' living room, joined by Matt, his wife Elaine, and TJ, the street-smart Matt's sidekick.

Yet my main complain about the novel is the gratuitous porn of gore ('gratuitous' being the key word here); I have read about 20 novels by Mr. Block (and reviewed 13 on Goodreads), and this is the first time I think he goes over the top with the inclusion of excessive details of sadistic murders.

Also, from the literary point of view, in several places in the novel it feels as if the author is padding the text and artificially slowing down the progress of the plot in order to fill the quota of the number of pages. That's a pity because - as in most other books by the author - the reader will find many well-written passages. The beginning fragments of the novel evoke the mood of wistful melancholy, yet, at the same time, sparkle with dark humor:

"So that's one funeral I missed, but these days there's always another funeral to go. They're like buses. If you miss one, there'll be another coming your way in a few minutes."

Marginally recommended, mainly for the engrossing plot.

Two-and-three-quarter stars.

View all my reviews