Fiction Reviews
The Tainted Cup
(2024) Robert Jackson Bennett, Hodderscape, £22, hrdbk, 413pp, ISBN 978-1-399-72535-4
Robert Jackson Bennett may not be a writer who immediately springs to mind as a genre writer, but he has been steadily producing fantasy of merit for the last decade or so. He has been nominated for a Hugo Award, and been a World Fantasy, British Fantasy and a Locus Award finalist, not to mention having received the Edgar Award, the Shirley Jackson Award and the Philip K. Dick Citation of Excellence. From Weird Tales-ian horror to outright fantasy, RJB has written thoughtful, literate and intelligent fiction. The Tainted Cup is no exception. Set in what seemed to me to be a pseudo-oriental world where an empire rules, the plot is a murder mystery with a fantastical twist.
Told from the viewpoint of assistant trainee investigator Signum Dinios Kol, Kol is given the task of helping investigator Ana Dolabra in solving a very unusual murder. Din is an ‘engraver’, someone with eidetic memory whose main function is to note and record everything he sees. The pair have been brought together in Daretana, off the beaten track, to determine the cause and reasons for the death of Commander Blas. It seems that he was suddenly killed by a plant growing out of him within a matter of minutes. Is it an accident? A weird quirk of nature? Or something more sinister, and possibly a threat to the state?
Straight away the vibes of a crime-fighting duo are given, a trope going back to Seabury Quinn’s Jules de Guardin, or the obvious Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson – the publicity on the book cover points this one out. However, more than just a Watson-like subsidiary, Kol is effectively Ana’s eyes and ears, working on behalf of the state. This is important as Din soon discovers that although Ana is a detective whose reputation for brilliance is matched only by her eccentricities, she rarely leaves her house and yet can solve impossible cases without even stepping outside the walls of her home. When meeting people in her duties she wears a blindfold at all times, in order to help focus on the details. Whilst some may see this as an occupational difficulty, and despite barely knowing each other, they work together well.
So far this sounds like a straightforward, if slightly unusual, locked-room detective novel, but there are some nicely unusual elements that make it more fantastical and to me more interesting. Away from the case, the overriding threat is that the city of Talagray, near to Daretana, is awaiting the imminent return of a Godzilla-like leviathan from the ocean. Previous experiences have shown that unless these leviathans are killed or driven back, their arrival causes destruction to Talagray and the injuring and death of many people. This creates a certain tension and urgency to get the case solved, because with this the army and officials of the city that Din and Ana’s have come to as part of their inquiry become harder to investigate.
Secondly, the world-building is subtle and interesting. Although our focus is on Din and Ana, the world around them generally seems to be one of imperialistic decay, leviathans aside. With its cantons and military ranks I could imagine it being Eastern European or Asian, although it is clearly a world of RJB’s making. The dialogue used, the outfits worn and the weaponry used all gave me an impression of some sort of cross between Imperialist China and steampunk. This blending of different cultures sounds odd, but it works.
The society is also interesting in that many of the Empire’s servants, including Din, have assisted means of performing their work. This usually involves the injection or ingestion of serums, powders and vapours in order to enhance such things as their memory, their physical prowess, their intelligence and their capacity to heal themselves. Thoughts of Batman’s Bane did cross my mind here!
Most of all though, the book works best on its characterisation. Ana is an intriguingly complex person - a hyperintelligent savant with aspects of her personality that I would suggest put her upon the autistic spectrum, but whose erratic actions belie the intellect at work underneath the sweary language and odd mannerisms. Din is almost the polar opposite – calm (usually), methodical, thoughtful, although with secrets of his own to hide. They compliment each other as a team, and this helps the plot enormously.
As to the plot, well it’s a New Weird version of a locked room mystery. Bennett himself admits in the book’s acknowledgements that his inspiration for the novel came in part from old Nero Wolfe detective stories he read when younger. If we take that as fact, then really this is a Nero Wolfe detective story combined with something out of Jeff Vandermeer’s Annihilation, or perhaps going further back, the New Weird of J. G. Ballard. There are moments when it felt like we moved from one set piece to another, but on the positive side those times were not too often.
I must admit that I worked out the culprit before the end, but I enjoyed getting to that point enormously.
In summary, Jackson Bennett’s story is both familiar in structure and unusual in form and characterisation. It was a memorable read and I would love to read more about this place. Ana and Kol are a great team and the Empire of Khanum is an intriguing environment. There is scope for other books after this, and I hope that it happens.
Mark Yon
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