Untrustworthy storyteller part of novel's appeal.

Kadin Noel

11 August 2008

This novel, her 37th, is an example of the wildest.

It is also just the second-best thing about the book. What's most provoking about the tale is Oates unravels the murder puzzle from the point of view of one of the least trustworthy storytellers imaginable. Nineteen-year-old Skyler Rampike, Bliss' older bro, is so shaky in his memories he cannot say for sure he did not kill his sister. For all Skyler's failings - Oates takes her time showing their extent - he writes beautifully. Weird writing One can argue with Oates' call to let Skyler sometimes write in addition to she does. What number uneasy teens could compose so fine a sentence as this? "For when you practice every day, up to 2 hours every day, and when you're attempting new, ever more troublesome maneuvers, naturally you may falter occasionally, and you may slip occasionally, and fall hard.". The way to touch damaged storytellers, maybe, is to find poetry in their plain speech. But Oates has done that - her "Zombie" is a brilliant exercise in the art of the outwardly unedited confessional. Maybe one hundred pages longer than it must be, and crammed with Skyler's misinterpretations, it feels like a coarse draft that leaves the storyteller overexposed - just as Oates appears to intend. The up to date statement that Colorado prosecutors have cleared the complete Ramsey family in JonBenet's death does zip to take away from the drama of Oates' version of the crime, and the conflicted narration is a part of the explanation. The tale is as little about Skyler discovering himself, thru writing, as it is about discovering his sister's killer. Which makes it more galvanizing the massive show is devastating. Oates offers a sequence of trustworthy suspects, including the kids's folks : varsity athlete-turned-executive blowhard "Bix" Rampike, and Betsey Rampike, who sees Bliss' sorcery on the ice as a technique to gain celebrity, the status of her snobby neighbors and the love of her distant hubby. Also suspect is the Rampikes' whole price system.

They live in one of those simply satirised cities where kids take as many prescription drugs as their folks and elementary schoolers are placed in Ivy League prep courses. The book's just real weakness is what number pages Skyler - or Oates - devotes to ripping down such targets. She's too good at the massive challenges to waste time on such straightforward ones.