Review: Floating Souls by Mary H. Manhein
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I enjoyed Manhein's presentation about her first novel (she's previously written nonfiction books about her work as an LSU forensic anthropologist) at the 2012 Louisiana Book Festival, and her lively discussion piqued my interest in reading Floating Souls. Her passion for her work is palpable, and it comes through in the person of fictional protagonist Maggie Andrepont, who, like Manhein, is a forensic anthropologist. The novel is slim, moves quickly through a series of murders in New Orleans canals and even digresses for an interesting trip to Venice. Manhein defended the length of her book well at the festival -- "I like to get in and out" -- but we could benefit from greater character development of several central characters. For a manuscript of this size, she delivers too many characters for the novel's own good -- yet her plot coheres, her protagonist perseveres and the depiction of New Orleans deftly blends contemporary settings with immigrant history. She's not quite in the same league as her anthropology colleague and Baton Rouge novelist Malcolm Shuman (but with 30 manuscripts and a dozen novels under his belt, few are), yet Manhein has a potential hit genre series on her hands if she can bring to life the layers of her characters' personalities and motivations with as much skill as she describes an autopsy. Manhein promises a followup and a return to Venice, and the trip should be well worth the taking.
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My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I enjoyed Manhein's presentation about her first novel (she's previously written nonfiction books about her work as an LSU forensic anthropologist) at the 2012 Louisiana Book Festival, and her lively discussion piqued my interest in reading Floating Souls. Her passion for her work is palpable, and it comes through in the person of fictional protagonist Maggie Andrepont, who, like Manhein, is a forensic anthropologist. The novel is slim, moves quickly through a series of murders in New Orleans canals and even digresses for an interesting trip to Venice. Manhein defended the length of her book well at the festival -- "I like to get in and out" -- but we could benefit from greater character development of several central characters. For a manuscript of this size, she delivers too many characters for the novel's own good -- yet her plot coheres, her protagonist perseveres and the depiction of New Orleans deftly blends contemporary settings with immigrant history. She's not quite in the same league as her anthropology colleague and Baton Rouge novelist Malcolm Shuman (but with 30 manuscripts and a dozen novels under his belt, few are), yet Manhein has a potential hit genre series on her hands if she can bring to life the layers of her characters' personalities and motivations with as much skill as she describes an autopsy. Manhein promises a followup and a return to Venice, and the trip should be well worth the taking.
View all my reviews