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WORK TITLE: The Moment Before Drowning
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1980
WEBSITE:
CITY: St. Albans
STATE:
COUNTRY: United Kingdom
NATIONALITY: British
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1980; married; children: one daughter.
EDUCATION:University of Oxford, graduated, 2002.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer and crossword setter. Setter of crosswords for publications, including the London Guardian, the Spectator, and the London Times.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
James Brydon is a writer and crossword setter. He holds a degree from the University of Oxford. Brydon has set crosswords for publications, including the London Guardian, the Spectator, and the London Times. His crossword setter pseudonyms are Lavatch and Picaroon. In an interview with Alan Connor, contributor to the London Guardian website, Brydon discussed his early interest in crosswords, stating: “My parents solved the Guardian and Everyman puzzles and that taught me the basics. Araucaria and Bunthorne [crossword setters] got me hooked but they gave me an education too. They didn’t just set riddles: their puzzles were full of fascinating cultural references to things that I would never have found out about in school.” Regarding his pseudonyms, Brydon told Connor: “I chose Lavatch, the clown in All’s Well That Ends Well, when I was an undergraduate studying for a paper on Shakespeare and was struck by how much crossword-type wordplay appears in his work (especially in Love’s Labour’s Lost). I think the name reflects my understanding of clue-writing: half subtle, linguistic play and half buffoonery. For similar reasons, I like the meaning of Picaroon as a rogue or someone who lives by his wits, and the reference to the rascally heroes of picaresque literature.”
In 2018, Brydon released The Moment Before Drowning. It is narrated by a Frenchman named Capt. Jacques le Garrec. He has been serving as an interrogator for the Army in Algeria and his sent back to France after being accused of a crime. Le Garrec settles in Sainte-Elisabeth, where he grew up. There, he is drawn into the investigation of a local teenaged girl’s death, whose family had connections to the Nazis. Meanwhile, le Garrec deals with post-traumatic stress disorder stemming from the violence he saw while serving in North Africa.
“This is a remarkably assured debut by a gifted new writer,” asserted a Publishers Weekly critic. A writer in Kirkus Reviews suggested: “Though the descriptive prose is sometimes overcooked, the characters are alive and the mystery is mostly satisfying.” The same writer described the book as “an erudite and entertaining addition to the shelf.” A contributor to the Tonstant Weader Reviews website remarked: “There is a real mystery and Gerrac is an interesting and compelling character.” A reviewer on the Novel Historian website opined: “Brydon handles both narratives with skill and an elegant simplicity I admire. The whodunit part, the standard, expected tale, remains tense to the end, though the number of suspects is small, and the evidence is in plain sight. But the greater pleasure of this fine debut novel derives from the parallel narratives of the torture cells in Algeria and the murder investigation, a terrific juxtaposition.” The same reviewer concluded: “The Moment Before Drowning is well worth reading (with the caveat that there are many scenes of torture, so be warned).” “It’s a short novel but Mr. Brydon packs in so much emotion, suspense, tension and heartbreak,” asserted a critic on the Marjorie’s World of Books website. Writing on the New York Journal of Books website, Benjamin Welton commented: “The Moment Before Drowning is a highly lyrical novel. Brydon’s prose is exquisite, and he certainly knows how to set a scene. The problem with this book is that it is preachy, intentionally cerebral, and its plot goes nowhere. The pleasure of reading this book is also constantly undercut by the many (and repetitive) flashback scenes set in Al-Mazra’a.” A reviewer on the Historical Novel Society website stated: “Brydon handles the mystery cleverly.” That reviewer concluded: “The Moment Before Drowning … should please readers of historical mysteries, especially those who like their stories character-driven.” Paul Burke, contributor to the Nudge website, called the volume “a stunning and intelligent debut novel; powerful, intense and raw.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Kirkus Reviews, May 15, 2018, review of The Moment Before Drowning.
Publishers Weekly, May 7, 2018, review of The Moment Before Drowning, p. 49.
ONLINE
A for Authors, http://aforauthors.co.uk/ (October 5, 2018), author profile.
Akashic Books, http://www.akashicbooks.com/ (October 5, 2018), author profile.
Historical Novel Society, https://historicalnovelsociety.org/ (October 5, 2018), review of The Moment Before Drowning.
London Guardian Online, https://www.theguardian.com/ (November 3, 2014), Alan Connor, author interview.
Marjorie’s World of Books, https://marjoriesworldofbooks.wordpress.com/ (October 5, 2018), review of The Moment Before Drowning.
New York Journal of Books, https://www.nyjournalofbooks.com/ (October 5, 2018), Benjamin Welton, review of The Moment Before Drowning.
Novel Historian, https://novelhistorian.com/ (August 13, 2018), review of The Moment Before Drowning.
Nudge, https://nudge-book.com/ (August 26, 2018), Paul Burke, review of The Moment Before Drowning.
Tonstant Weader Reviews, https://tonstantweaderreviews.wordpress.com/ (June 25, 2018), review of The Moment Before Drowning.
James Brydon
Our Authors > James Brydon
James Brydon grew up in North Shropshire and read English and Modern Languages at Oxford, graduating with a First in 2002. He has lived in several different countries including China, Hungary and Serbia and is a frequent visitor to Belgrade, the home city of his wife.
Between periods abroad, he completed a doctorate focusing on representations of war in twentieth-century French literature. He has published articles in English and French on various writers, including Jean-Paul Sartre, examining how conceptions of the events of World War Two influenced literary narratives. He is especially interested in the intersections of literature and history, and has now moved from academic writing to fiction, exploring the traumatic and contested past of post-war France.
For over a decade, he has worked as a cryptic crossword setter. As Picaroon, he sets two puzzles a month in the Guardian, and he compiles for the Spectator, the Times and the fiendish Listener puzzle, drawing inspiration for themes from sources as diverse as the films of Akira Kurosawa and the six-fold symmetry of snowflakes.
He is an enthusiastic linguist. Aside from French, he is fluent in Serbian, is currently polishing his German, and can hold a conversation in passable Chinese. He lives in St Albans with his wife and three-year-old daughter.
The Moment Before Drowning, James’ debut novel, will be published in the US by Akashic Books in July 2018. Further details can be found here: http://www.akashicbooks.com/catalog/the-moment-before-drowning/ .
James Brydon
James Brydon
JAMES BRYDON grew up in North Shropshire, England, and studied English at Oxford. For over a decade, he has worked as a cryptic crossword setter. Under the name Picaroon, he sets two puzzles a month in the Guardian, and he compiles for the Spectator, the Times of London, and the fiendish Listener puzzle, drawing inspiration from sources as diverse as the films of Akira Kurosawa and the six-fold symmetry of snowflakes. He is fluent in French and Serbian, is currently polishing his German, and can hold a conversation in passable Chinese. He lives in St. Albans, England, with his wife and daughter. The Moment Before Drowning is his debut novel.
QUOTED: "My parents solved the Guardian and Everyman puzzles and that taught me the basics. Araucaria and Bunthorne got me hooked but they gave me an education too. They didn’t just set riddles: their puzzles were full of fascinating cultural references to things that I would never have found out about in school."
"I chose Lavatch, the clown in All’s Well That Ends Well, when I was an undergraduate studying for a paper on Shakespeare and was struck by how much crossword-type wordplay appears in his work (especially in Love’s Labour’s Lost). I think the name reflects my understanding of clue-writing: half subtle, linguistic play and half buffoonery. For similar reasons, I like the meaning of Picaroon as a rogue or someone who lives by his wits, and the reference to the rascally heroes of picaresque literature."
Crossword blog: meet the setter – Picaroon
Alan Connor turns the tables on the torturers. Under the spotlight this time is James Brydon, aka Picaroon
Alan Connor
Mon 3 Nov 2014 06.22 EST Last modified on Mon 24 Apr 2017 04.23 EDT
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Colin Hurly as Lavatch in All's Well That Ends Well.
Colin Hurly as Lavatch in All’s Well That Ends Well. Photograph: Tristram Kenton
Picaroon has been setting for the Guardian since March 2012.
His first puzzle arrived so fully formed that some solvers thought this must be a new pseudonym for an old hand, but no: Picaroon is James Brydon, who also sets as Lavatch in the Spectator, and with the same nom de guerre in some astonishing Listener puzzles.
When we spoke to the Spectator puzzle editor Tom Johnson last year, he declared himself proud to have “‘discovered’ Lavatch about 10 years ago when he submitted a few unsolicited cryptic puzzles to 1 Across magazine”, adding that “his smooth and elegant clueing style mark him as the doyen of the younger British setters”.
Among my favourites of his clues is from that first Guardian puzzle: “It’s coming to a point where a Liberal is propping up right-winger in charge (7)” for CONICAL.
So let’s meet this setter ...
When/where do you create your puzzles?
I tend to scribble clues everywhere, often surreptitiously when I should be doing something else. Being busy with real life and a small child means taking advantage of whatever spare minutes I can find.
When did you get the crossword bug?
In my early teens. My parents solved the Guardian and Everyman puzzles and that taught me the basics. Araucaria and Bunthorne got me hooked but they gave me an education too.
They didn’t just set riddles: their puzzles were full of fascinating cultural references to things that I would never have found out about in school.
What’s your favourite of your own clues or puzzles?
I tend to remember puzzles longer than clues – especially Listener puzzles – because of the days of maddening seclusion trying to construct them.
I’m still quite partial to a puzzle of mine based on Kurosawa’s Rashomon, where there were 65,536 possible different grid fills that could be generated from the clues.
I also like the visual effect of a circular puzzle which, after cutting, ended up as a lacy snowflake inscribed with “[the] frolic architecture of [the] snow” from Emerson’s poem The Snowstorm.
Since my memory of clues doesn’t extend too far, I’ll just mention a recent clue that I did like:
2d/10ac New ref took latitude, playing advantage for Eden Hazard (4,2,9)
I’ll give the answer below. I remember being so engrossed in that Rashomon puzzle that I had to pop into shop doorways to fill in letters whenever inspiration struck. Where else have you been tempted to take the concept of multiple solutions?
Having wrestled with the folly of it once, I’ve vowed never to try it again.
Wherever the idea might go, it’s probably just a detour on the way to what a crossword ultimately needs to be satisfying: a unique solution.
Right-o. Which other setters do you admire?
At the Guardian, I always enjoy Brendan’s thematic dexterity and Arachne’s mixture of erudition and espièglerie.
I find that my Spectator colleagues Dumpynose and Mr Magoo combine ingenious thematic ideas with stylish clues. Ferret, as a newer arrival on the scene, has produced some dazzling grid constructions and elegant clues.
What makes a successful clue?
Precision. Misdirection. An amusing surface reading. But more than that, some spark of inspiration that’s hard to quantify.
The following, from Paul, has lingered in my mind for years:
20ac If you want ‘thick’, get this: right lot of racists admitted to their ‘problem’? (9)
The concept is brilliant, totally unobvious, and the whole thing is realised, for no apparent reason, in a fantastic pastiche of “yoofspeak”.
And what makes an unsuccessful one?
A nonsensical, “crosswordy” surface reading or lots of first, last, or middle letters.
How did you choose your pseudonyms?
Advertisement
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I chose Lavatch, the clown in All’s Well That Ends Well, when I was an undergraduate studying for a paper on Shakespeare and was struck by how much crossword-type wordplay appears in his work (especially in Love’s Labour’s Lost).
I think the name reflects my understanding of clue-writing: half subtle, linguistic play and half buffoonery.
For similar reasons, I like the meaning of Picaroon as a rogue or someone who lives by his wits, and the reference to the rascally heroes of picaresque literature.
How do you imagine a solver of your crosswords?
Perplexed at first, but diverted by the entertaining surfaces and then, as the answers start to fall, emitting contented “ah”s and admiring chuckles until the last answer settles into place with an intellectually satisfying snap.
Well, you did say “imagine”, right?
What’s the future for cryptic crosswords?
There are certainly plenty of excellent setters emerging like Rorschach, eXternal and Shark. As far as production goes, technology is allowing incredible grid constructions that would have been impossible until recently.
And as for distribution, the internet should be key. I’d like to see more publications like The Magpie which aims its content purely at crossworders and caters for interests that some of the mainstream publications wouldn’t.
I understand that you’re a solver of French and Serbian puzzles. What are the most interesting differences as compared to English-language cryptics?
For starters, they aren’t cryptic. Good French crosswords have a sort of Rufus-esque, ludic quality, such as “Déjeuner sur l’herbe” to define BROUTER.
Serbian crosswords are just definition and answer (and some tempestuous debates about whether the words used actually exist or whether the compiler has just made them up to fit the spaces).
Grammatically speaking, English is an amazingly flexible language with no genders, adjective agreements or case endings and minimal verb conjugations. This, I think, rather than any supposed “English mentality”, is what makes cryptic clue writing possible and explains why it can’t easily be replicated in most other languages.
And I would bet a large sum that you have read Landscape Painted with Tea in both English and the vernacular. For those of us who can only read it in English, what are we missing?
Great Slavic runs of consonants like in “strpljenje” and “Ävrst”.
Ooh. Now, is setting art or craft?
Both. Basically, it’s a craft, but a great deal of “art” is just mastery of craft and there’s much artistry in the best examples of many banal everyday objects such as crossword puzzles.
It’s amazing how a simple square with words in it has evolved, over the last hundred years, to become much more than just a “game”: the best crosswords can be witty reflections of their authors’ personalities; they communicate political and social messages; they play with complex ideas like Klein bottles, recreate historical events like the Dambusters raids and echo the structures of artistic works by constructing clues in verse. Long may this adventurous spirit endure!
Do you remember the first clue you solved or wrote?
I think that solving “Like Venus de Milo, wouldn’t ’urt a fly (7)” at the age of about 10 was my first success.
My earliest attempts to write clues have been mercifully destroyed and all memories of them systematically repressed.
A pity. How do people respond if and when you tell them you’re a crossword setter?
They often seem genuinely interested and then say something bizarre like “you must have a really good general knowledge”.
Is a propensity to play games with words ever a nuisance to yourself or others?
It’s thoroughly aggravating when you’re trying to read something engrossing and can’t stop spotting potential anagrams or wordplay breakdowns.
And if you weren’t a crossword setter, what would you be?
A little less busy and a lot more bored.
Many thanks to Picaroon for another engrossing encounter. The answers to the clues above are: for the ‘Eden Hazard’ clue (not as recent as when I first spoke to Picaroon), TREE OF KNOWLEDGE; for ‘If you want thick’, CORNFLOUR and, for the Venus de Milo, surely, ARMLESS.
Since you’re here…
… we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian than ever, but advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. And unlike many news organisations, we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as we can. So you can see why we need to ask for your help.
The Guardian is editorially independent. So we set our own agenda. Our journalism is free from commercial bias. It isn’t influenced by billionaire owners, politicians or shareholders. No one edits our Editor. No one steers our opinion. This means we can give a voice to the voiceless. It lets us challenge the powerful - and hold them to account. And at a time when factual, honest reporting is critical, it’s what sets us apart from so many others.
The Guardian’s long term sustainability relies on the support that we receive directly from our readers. And we would like to thank the hundreds of thousands who are helping to secure our future. But we cannot stop here. As more of you offer your ongoing support, we can keep investing in quality investigative journalism and analysis. We can remain a strong, progressive force that is open to all.
If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps to support it, our future would be much more secure. For as little as $1, you can support the Guardian – and it only takes a minute. Thank you.
QUOTED: "This is a remarkably assured debut by a gifted new writer."
9/30/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
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Print Marked Items
The Moment Before Drowning
Publishers Weekly.
265.19 (May 7, 2018): p49.
COPYRIGHT 2018 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
* The Moment Before Drowning
James Brydon. Akashic, $25.95 (224p) ISBN 978-1-61775-625-2
On Dec. 12,1959, Capt. Jacques le Garrec, the narrator of British author Brydon's provocative and
unsettling first novel, returns in disgrace to his hometown of Sainte-Elisabeth in Brittany. He's accused of
committing a terrible crime in Algeria, where he has spent the last two years in the French army intelligence
services interrogating Algerian insurgents. While le Garrec, a former police detective and WWII Resistance
fighter, awaits trial, an old acquaintance asks him to look into the murder of Anne-Lise Aurigny, a brilliant
high school student whose mutilated body was found outside Sainte-Elisabeth in a field of heather the
previous winter. Le Garrec soon learns that Anne Lise's father was a German officer and her mother was
brutalized after the war as a supposed Nazi sympathizer. As le Garrec investigates further, he's troubled by
the memories of the atrocities he witnessed in Algeria and of the 19-year-old Algerian girl he was powerless
to save. This is a remarkably assured debut by a gifted new writer. Agent: Bill Goodall, A for Authors
(U.K.). (July)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"The Moment Before Drowning." Publishers Weekly, 7 May 2018, p. 49. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A538858675/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=de863ab0.
Accessed 30 Sept. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A538858675
QUOTED: "Though the descriptive prose is sometimes overcooked, the characters are alive and the mystery is mostly satisfying."
"an erudite and entertaining addition to the shelf."
9/30/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1538349129188 2/2
Brydon, James: THE MOMENT
BEFORE DROWNING
Kirkus Reviews.
(May 15, 2018):
COPYRIGHT 2018 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Brydon, James THE MOMENT BEFORE DROWNING Akashic (Adult Fiction) $25.95 7, 3 ISBN: 978-1-
61775-652-8
An exploration of political oppression wrapped in a carefully constructed mystery.
In Brydon's auspicious debut, Capitaine Jacques le Garrec is a member of the French Resistance who, after
the war, joined the Paris police and, in 1957, was seconded to the intelligence service, serving as an
interrogator at al-Mazra'a during the Algerian Revolution. In 1959 he returns to France in disgrace. A
"heinous crime" has been committed, and his culpability in it will be determined at a hearing in a week's
time. He is permitted to return home to Sainte-Elisabeth in Brittany until the hearing. When he arrives he is
asked by an old friend to investigate the unsolved murder of Anne-Lise Aurigny; as his investigation of this
young woman's death proceeds, the nature of the "heinous crime" is revealed in a series of flashbacks: A
young Algerian woman has died in his custody, and in his report, le Garrec accuses the commander of alMazra'a,
Lt.-Col. Lambert, whose first demand of le Garrec was that he shoot a prisoner, of maintaining a
brutal and bigoted colonial rule. This, more than the woman's death, is his crime. In a parallel conflict, le
Garrec must contend with the nihilistic Capt. Lafourgue of the Sainte-Elisabeth police, who believes that
the role of the police is to "scare people...to create terror," and to be "the tentacles of power made visible."
The two commanders are the poles of le Garrec's existence as he struggles to bring meaning to the deaths of
the women, while behind the Algerian sun the spirit of Sartre smiles down. Though the descriptive prose is
sometimes overcooked, the characters are alive and the mystery is mostly satisfying.
An erudite and entertaining addition to the shelf.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Brydon, James: THE MOMENT BEFORE DROWNING." Kirkus Reviews, 15 May 2018. General
OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A538294092/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=dfd00ed5. Accessed 30 Sept. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A538294092
QUOTED: "There is a real mystery and Gerrac is an interesting and compelling character."
The Moment Before Drowning by James Brydon
The Moment Before Drowning by James Brydon
The Moment Before Drowning has everything I love in a mystery, a strong sense of place, a historical connection in time and place, rich language and description, intrigue, moral equivocation, a complex and flawed main character, and literature and philosophy are woven into the thoughts and conversations of the main characters. Add to that, it takes place in the same setting as Martin Walker’s Bruno, Chief of Police series, and I was eager to read.
In The Moment Before Drowning, Jacques le Gerrac has come back to France to be tried for the murder of an Algerian woman. While waiting for trial and at loose ends, he goes to his hometown where he is immediately asked to investigate an unsolved murder. A young girl, Anne-Lise, was murdered and mutilated and her body was staged. The local police officer is more thug than thinker. Unable to wrest confessions after “interrogation” the case has stalled.
Gerrac interviews friends, family, and possible lovers building a picture of Anne-Lise However, his investigation and his conception of Anne-Lise are continually interrupted by his memory of Amira, the Algerian woman he is accused of murdering and his observation and participation in the torture interrogations of the FLN, the Algerian resistance. From history, we know there were many atrocities and Gerrac is revealed to be a reluctant participant, persuaded to serve out of the idea that if people of good will were perpetrating the ill-conceived war and repression, it would be somehow better. This is a good example of how good people do evil. If I didn’t do it, someone who enjoyed it would do it.
Despite everything going for it, I was disappointed in The Moment Before Drowning. There are several reasons, but they are all related to how didactic it is. Mostly it’s a failure to let ideas develop naturally, but delivering them instead as something Gerrac reads, questions answered in class, speechifying by characters, and courtroom testimony. It’s not natural, not conversational. It sticks out like the sore thumb it is, shoved into an intriguing story, distorting the narrative. The primary purpose of a story is the story. When that is displaced by a desire to indict the past, the story fails. It’s even more frustrating when I agree with the moral lesson, but find it intrusive.
As a mystery, it is only fair if you take the time to put the German and French quotations into Google translate or are familiar with Rilke and Baudelaire. When the primary clues are untranslated, it’s annoying to have to look them up. Still, it’s technically fair, but why leave the French poetry untranslated when after all, the entire story is about this French man in France. It would not be in a foreign language to him as he reads it so it should not be for us. It seemed like needless pedantry.
However, the book is not terrible. There is a real mystery and Gerrac is an interesting and compelling character. I can imagine that sequels may be more intriguing and more compelling now the author does not have to show off how smart he is anymore.
The Moment Before Drowning will be published on July 3rd. I received a copy from Akashic Books through LibraryThing and Edelweiss
QUOTED: "Brydon handles both narratives with skill and an elegant simplicity I admire. The whodunit part, the standard, expected tale, remains tense to the end, though the number of suspects is small, and the evidence is in plain sight. But the greater pleasure of this fine debut novel derives from the parallel narratives of the torture cells in Algeria and the murder investigation, a terrific juxtaposition."
"The Moment Before Drowning is well worth reading (with the caveat that there are many scenes of torture, so be warned)."
August 13, 2018
Colonial Thinking: The Moment Before Drowning
13
Monday
Aug 2018
Posted by Novelhistorian in Reviews and Columns ≈ Leave a comment
Tags1959, Algeria, book review, Brittany, colonialism, emotional transitions, historical fiction, inner and outer journeys, James Brydon, literary fiction, mystery fiction, racism, rule of law
Review: The Moment Before Drowning, by James Brydon
Akashic, 2018. 224 pp. $26
When Captain Jacques le Garrec returns to his native Brittany in December 1959, his arrival creates a stir, as a former Resistance hero and police detective, a local boy who made good. But the wrong kind of notoriety trails him too, because he’s been brought back to France to face accusations regarding his interrogations of suspected terrorists in the colonial war in Algeria. In the days preceding his legal hearing, a local lycée teacher has asked him to investigate the death and mutilation of a brilliant girl, a student of his. This is a distraction for le Garrec, to be sure, but that’s what he needs.
It’s a small town, where everybody knows everything about everyone else, or thinks they do, so it’s somewhat surprising that the police haven’t solved the crime. However, they haven’t tried hard, a mystery in itself. Another puzzle is why le Garrec has returned in apparent disgrace. Did he torture one too many civilians, and is that really considered a crime by the French forces pursuing this increasingly savage, unwinnable war? Or is his crime something different?
Brydon handles both narratives with skill and an elegant simplicity I admire. The whodunit part, the standard, expected tale, remains tense to the end, though the number of suspects is small, and the evidence is in plain sight. But the greater pleasure of this fine debut novel derives from the parallel narratives of the torture cells in Algeria and the murder investigation, a terrific juxtaposition that asks what purpose law and its enforcement actually serve. And that’s why le Garrec’s in trouble, because he dared pose that question in Algeria.
Consequently, the conflict occurs in le Garrec’s head, as his memories of Algeria deny him sleep, and in his investigation. Not only does the dead Breton girl recall a young woman he interrogated (the event prompting the charges against him); the police inspector, a brutal bigot, reminds him of his superior in Algeria. Lafourgue, the inspector, is a well-drawn character, and as a petty ego inflated with barely repressed rage and unsatisfied desire, he makes a good foil for le Garrec. The contempt that Lafourgue expresses for the murder victim shocks le Garrec and perhaps explains why the inspector has felt no particular urgency to find the killer. But Brydon’s accomplishing much more than thematic development here. He’s linked his protagonist’s inner and outer journeys, a winning combination every time, if done right.
And Brydon does a lot right, starting with the vivid prose:
As I walk from the bus stop along familiar, deserted streets the sky seems enormous, bloated, and infinite, billowing over everything. I lose myself in swirls of gray; great, bulbous streaks of darkness; every possible permutation of impending rain. After two years in Algeria I feel the Breton damp seeping into my body, chilling me, and the ice carried on the wind settling in my blood. Out by the sea, which I can perceive only as a howl frustrated by the rocks, the beam of the lighthouse flashes its warning into the encroaching dark: a fragile blade of light that swings away and is lost, only to return each time and abide in the blindness of the night.
Where he goes wrong, I think, is to rush. Sometimes, the characters don’t speak so much as they expound, which sounds canned, intended to reveal essential information or a person’s trait in a single passage. I notice this especially in the beginning and whenever le Garrec interviews witnesses for the first time. What’s the hurry? Engage the reader emotionally, and you can write at Tolstoyan length. What creates tension isn’t information about le Garrec but who and what he loves, his feelings about himself and his situation, his struggle to redeem himself. Brydon conveys that, of course; if he didn’t, his novel could be half the size it is, yet not work. It seems like a lack of trust (or poor editorial advice) that has led him to sprint through emotional changes as if the words were on fire, which then requires him to move on to what comes next to put it out. But those are actually the moments in which the reader wants to insert him- or herself into the narrative and ask what he or she would do under the same circumstances. End that connection abruptly, and the novelist breaks the mood, yanking the reader out of the narrative.
Nevertheless, I think that The Moment Before Drowning is well worth reading (with the caveat that there are many scenes of torture, so be warned). I look forward to seeing what the author can do once he gains more confidence in his readers and, perhaps, himself.
Disclaimer: I obtained my reading copy of this book from the publisher via Historical Novels Review, where this post first appeared in shorter, different form.
QUOTED: "It’s a short novel but Mr. Brydon packs in so much emotion, suspense, tension and heartbreak."
TAG: JAMES BRYDON
Very impressive debut novel
book
The Moment Before Drowning by James Brydon
Book Review: 5 out of 5 star rating
Capitaine Jacques le Garrec has returned to Paris in disgrace. He was a hero in the French Resistance but now is facing charges of a terrible crime that occurred in Algiers, where he was working in the Army Intelligence Service. While he’s waiting trial, he’s asked to investigate the unsolved murder of a local teenage girl. The French town where this murder took place has a history of German occupation that has left its impact on the residents. As le Garrec looks into the murder, his memories of what happened in Algiers often collides with the investigation.
I’m very impressed by this author’s debut novel. It’s a short novel but Mr. Brydon packs in so much emotion, suspense, tension and heartbreak. This story literally took my breath away and has left me shaken. Be forewarned that this book is not for the faint hearted. It’s a brutally violent book with graphic descriptions of horrendous torture. Capitaine le Garrec is a broken man, torn apart by his work in Algiers. The moral dilemma he’s faced with is a tragic one. There was never a moment in this book that I wasn’t completely engrossed. The ending was pure perfection. This book will haunt me for some time to come. This author is one to be reckoned with and I hope his next literary work will be published soon.
Most highly recommended.
This book was given to me by the publisher in return for an honest review.
QUOTED: "The Moment Before Drowning is a highly lyrical novel. Brydon’s prose is exquisite, and he certainly knows how to set a scene. The problem with this book is that it is preachy, intentionally cerebral, and its plot goes nowhere. The pleasure of reading this book is also constantly undercut by the many (and repetitive) flashback scenes set in Al-Mazra'a."
Reviewed by:
Benjamin Welton
“The Moment Before Drowning is a highly lyrical novel.”
Winter in Brittany can be haunting. The winter of 1959 was especially haunting for Jacques le Garrec, a man recently returned to his native Breton village with a lifetime’s worth of ghosts. Once upon a time, le Garrec was a national hero—a member of the Resistance that fought against German occupation during World War II. However, after the war ended, le Garrec joined the police in Paris, then was attached to the service de renseignement in Algeria. There, le Garrec witnessed unimaginable horrors at Al-Mazra’a (The Farm), a veritable torture chamber run by the French military. The images of blackened Algerian corpses with bruised flesh never leave le Garrec alone in this slim volume.
The Moment Before Drowning takes place over the course of nine days. On the first day, le Garrec returns to his home town from Algiers. It is not a happy homecoming, for le Garrec is suspected of murdering an Algerian woman who was under his supervision.
Things get worse for the former war hero when his friend, the philosophy teacher Erwann Olivier, more or less hires him to investigate the mutilation and murder of local girl Anne-Lise. Erwann believes that the boorish local investigator, Captaine Lafourgue, did a terrible job in handling the now cold case. Unbeknown to le Garrec, his unofficial examination of the life and death of Anne-Lise leads him to uncover an older rape and murder involving another teenage girl.
The Moment Before Drowning has many colorful characters, but most are mere stereotypes.
Christian de la Halliere is two-dimensional “fascist” who fought with the Wehrmacht on the Eastern Front, and when le Garrec questions him about Anne-Lise at his decrepit chateau, de la Halliere loses himself in a barrage of elitist, reactionary, and Nietzschean tropes.
On the other end of the political spectrum is the Russian immigrant Aleksandr (Sasha) Kuramakin, Anne-Lise’s former lover and a Communist who calls le Garrec a “fascist” for joining the French police. Even Lafourgue is a bit black-and-white; he is the typical violent-minded police officer who believes in terrorizing the citizens (especially if they are Communists).
The mystery at the heart of The Moment Before Drowning is underwhelming. The murder and mutilation of Anne-Lise may or may not be solved by the end of this book, but, for the most part, le Garrec fails to bring any kind of closure to the people of his small hometown.
The vast majority of this book is made up of le Garrec’s flashbacks to Algeria, especially the torture chamber run by the sadistic Lambert. As such, The Moment Before Drowning is one extended political commentary about French colonial policies in Algeria and the nature of the French war against Algerian nationalists during the 1950s and 1960s.
Le Garrec is supposed to be the human and humane heart of this novel, but he often comes across as ineffectual, weak, and consumed by a hero-martyr complex. Basically, le Garrec is the type of guy who thinks that giving a ride to an abused Arab housekeeper will make up for what he witnessed in Algeria.
The Moment Before Drowning is a highly lyrical novel. Brydon’s prose is exquisite, and he certainly knows how to set a scene. The problem with this book is that it is preachy, intentionally cerebral, and its plot goes nowhere. The pleasure of reading this book is also constantly undercut by the many (and repetitive) flashback scenes set in Al-Mazra’a. It could be argued that The Moment Before Drowning might have been better off as a short story or novella, not a full-length novel.
Benjamin Welton is a freelance writer, music critic, author of fiction and poetry whose work has appeared in such publications as Crime magazine, Aberrant Labyrinth, Vermont's Seven Days newspaper, Vantage Point, The Weekly Standard, and others.
QUOTED: "Brydon handles the mystery cleverly."
"The Moment Before Drowning ... should please readers of historical mysteries, especially those who like their stories character-driven."
When Captain Jacques le Garrec returns to his native Brittany in December 1959, his arrival creates a stir, as a former Resistance hero and police detective, a local boy who made good. But he’s been brought back to France to face accusations regarding his interrogations of suspected terrorists in the colonial war in Algeria. In the days preceding his legal hearing, an old friend, a teacher, has asked him to investigate the death and mutilation of a female student, which the police couldn’t solve.
Brydon handles the mystery cleverly, casting suspicion here, then there. But the greater pleasure of this fine debut novel derives from the parallel narratives of the torture cells in Algeria and the murder investigation, a juxtaposition that asks what purpose law and its enforcement actually serve. The local police inspector’s bilious contempt for the dead girl makes him sound much like le Garrec’s former superior in Algeria talking about Arabs; and, like him, the inspector wields violence as if it were a plaything. With his petty ego, barely repressed rage, and unsatisfied desire, the inspector is a good foil for le Garrec and would fit right in as a colonist.
The prose vividly re-creates the Breton coast as well as the torture chambers (be warned), though Brydon mostly lets social attitudes portray the era. Sometimes the characters expound rather than talk, especially at the beginning, which has “exposition” written all over it. More serious, I think, is how the author rushes through a few key emotional transitions, as if he were afraid to linger. Even so, these are faults of many first novels. I recommend The Moment Before Drowning, which should please readers of historical mysteries, especially those who like their stories character-driven.
QUOTED: "A stunning and intelligent debut novel; powerful, intense and raw."
Review published on August 26, 2018.
A stunning and intelligent debut novel; powerful, intense and raw. The Moment Before Drowning is a insightful psychological portrait of a man on the edge. Capitaine le Garrec is accused of war crimes, the army is closing ranks against him, there’s a lot to hide. He is returned to France from Algeria to await trial where he begins investigating the murder of a girl in his childhood village in Brittany. Uncovering the details of the girl’s murder is a fraught experience that reignites flashbacks of the horror of the war in Algeria. He uncovers uncomfortable truths and very dark secrets in Saint-Élisabeth. The terrible legacy of WWII and the German occupation are in the past but events are about to reveal how much they scar the memory and impact daily life – Le Garrec is not the only one suffering. This is a novel about guilt, courage, reconciliation and atonement. The Moment Before Drowning raises important questions about human frailty, the nature of ‘evil’, the stresses of life in extremis and the choices we make. An intelligent and thought provoking thriller.
The Moment Before Drowning opens in weak sunlight at an Algerian airbase as Capitaine Jacques le Garrec is forced onto a transport plane. The details are not specified but the Capitaine is suspected of war crimes. One of the soldiers accompanying him says: “It’s people like you who are stopping us from ever winning this war. For every one of them we kill, we poison one hundred against us.” When they arriving, in a dank and miserable December Paris, le Garrec spends two days in a military prison before an examining magistrate releases him on his own recognizance to return to his childhood village, Saint-Élisabeth in Brittany.
How much he is the architect of his own downfall we don’t yet know, but he is traumatised by the experience of war. One moment, he’s overwhelmed by the strangeness of being home after so long away (his parents have died in his absence), the village is much changed. The next, his sanity is threatened by dark jolting flashbacks to the war and the cellars of al-mirza’a where the service de renseignements interrogated the Algerian prisoners. At this stage we can only guess at what he has been involved in: “It was part of the technique of interrogation: a suspect must lose, as quickly as possible, whatever links attached him to his own life.”
Erwann Ollivier is grateful that the resistance hero and ex-policeman has returned to Saint-Élisabeth, he wants le Garrec to investigate the death last winter of seventeen-year-old Anne-Lise Aurigny. A girl with a future (and also a tell-tale love of Baudelaire!) She was savagely beaten, strangled, stripped and left near a cliff top. The exchange between the two men is intense, Ollivier is passionate about finding the murderer of his favourite student, he’s emotionally involved. Ollivier has faith in le Garrec; not because of his police background but because of his philosophical nature. There appears to be no evidence to go on but there is something deeply disturbing at the heart of this crime and he is certain le Garrec will find it. Is he relying on what happened to le Garrec giving him insight into the case? Ollivier points that he has little else to do while he waits in limbo. The local police Chief, Capitaine Lefourgue, is a drunk more used to handling petty crime, he thinks the murder happened “because the girl was a whore.” He only cooperates with le Garrec because he thinks he is a hero for his actions in Algeria. There were three suspects, a local Nazi, an itinerant, and her boyfriend. Ollivier observes that the boy is harmless but then no child means to break a toy but they get broken anyway. Le Garrec doesn’t believe that he will get anywhere but sees the pathologist and the mother, unofficially. Witnesses contradict each other, but crucial details begin to emerge, is there some hope for le Garrec in finding the killer? As the picture of the suspects emerges parallels with le Garrec’s situation are drawn, this is a crime with complex but very human motives.
Le Garrec is haunted by harrowing images of war that keep coming back. The dead girl reminds him of Amina in Algeria, the case is dragging him further into the mire. It all started the day Lieutenant-Colonel Lambert told him the work they would be doing at al Mirza’a would save French lives, that “the Fellagha are a disease”. Soon he is struggling to make a distinction between insurgents, sympathisers and witnesses, lines quickly blur between right and wrong.
The Moment Before Drowning is a psychological murder mystery that rings true but it’s also a study of a man suffering from PTSD (flashbacks, blackouts). A man who has experienced the corrupting power of violence and faced the watershed moment when he can stand up for what is right or drown in a sea of degradation. How deep was his role in the murder of Amina? Is he seeking atonement in the case of the dead girl? The novel draws several parallels between le Garrec, the murderer and the experience of those abused in war. The novel shows the stupidity of torture and the growing insanity and brutality of war. To avoid plot spoiling I can’t say why the ending is so strong, but it’s poetic and doesn’t funk the issues raised.
All wars are messy and brutal but sometimes we need to be confronted by the horror to better understand the world we live in. When the Algerian War ended in 1962 French paratroopers were said to have marched out of the country singing ‘Je ne regretted rein’. Their conduct, and the conduct of the French army in general, was all the more brutal for the humiliation they suffered when kicked out of Vietnam (Indochine) a few years earlier. Brutal torture was common practice on both sides. This novel explores how a man who is a hero can become a pariah, how low a person can sink. A chilling, thrilling and stimulating read. The Algerian War is a topic well served by fiction. If you enjoy this novel, I would recommend The Question by Henri Alleg, On Leave by Daniel Anselme, Where I left My Soul by Jerome Ferrari and Children of the New World by Assia Djebar.
Paul Burke 5/4
The Moment Before Drowning by James Brydon
Akashic Books 9781617756252 hbk Aug 2018