tamaranth | 2024/065: The Gaugin Connection

2024/065: The Gaugin Connection — Estelle Ryan

The panic of such messiness sat in my throat like a large piece of dry bread. [p. 115]

Dr Genevieve Lenard is a high-functioning woman on the autistic spectrum: she's socially inept and does not understand irony or sarcasm, but is unparalleled at reading body language and other non-verbal cues, and at visualising patterns. She works at an insurance company, identifying fraudulent claims: her boss Phillip understands her limitations and knows how to give her space to excel. Genevieve's relationship with Phillip is based on respect and trust, so she's prepared to listen when Phillip's friend Manny, a police detective, asks for her help in solving what at first seems to be a simple murder investigation. Genevieve is forced to interact with people she considers criminals -- art forger Colin and his associate Vinnie, who seems to be pure muscle -- and discovers that, despite her dislike of change, she enjoys working with them.

This was an interesting read. Genevieve's first-person narrative, and her habits and tics and coping strategies (she writes out music by Mozart, from memory, when she's stressed), are intriguing and insightful. I wasn't wholly convinced by the relative suddenness with which she felt comfortable working with Colin, and I think there are a few inconsistencies in her behaviour, but on the whole she is an excellent viewpoint character, sometimes impatient with 'those of lesser intellect', sometimes overwhelmed (and vexed) by her own illogical responses to events, sometimes brutally -- or mercifully -- honest with other people.

The characters were more interesting than the actual crime, though that was complex enough to keep me guessing: the prose was fine. I'll look out for other books in the series.