海角大神

A teenage girl鈥檚 disappearance haunts a town in Joyce Carol Oates鈥檚 newest novel.

In Carthage, the town takes its rather inauspicious name from the North African city-state that Rome destroyed, salting the earth so that nothing would grow. Here in Michigan, we have a town named Hell 鈥� it might have been a more fortuitous choice.

鈥淐arthage鈥� also features a warrior and a spurned woman. It鈥檚 thoughtful, ambitious fiction written by an acknowledged master. It鈥檚 also pretty humorless. The plot hinges on one character鈥檚 monumental self-absorption and its toxic effect on a town. Oates is an author who can write as if she loathes her characters and that ability is on full display here.

At last count, Oates has written 140 books, with topics as diverse as an American family which is down on its luck (鈥渢hem鈥�), 1950s girl gangs (鈥淔irefox鈥�), Jeffrey Dahmer (鈥淶ombie鈥�), and Marilyn Monroe (鈥淏londe鈥�). I鈥檝e read about 20, starting with 1980鈥檚 Gothic 鈥淏ellefleur.鈥� It, 鈥淲e Were the Mulvaneys,鈥� and 鈥淭he Falls鈥� are among my personal favorites.

Cressida Mayfield vanished one July night in 2005. The 19-year-old college student was last seen in the Jeep of Brett Kincaid, a decorated Iraq veteran who suffered terrible injuries to both body and mind. He also, until recently, was the fianc茅 of Cressida鈥檚 older sister, Juliet.

Police found blood in the Jeep and Cressida鈥檚 sweater turned up in the river, but no body was ever found. Kincaid, his memory wrecked by alcohol, prescription drugs, and traumatic brain injury, cannot remember what happened that night.

"He was prone to seeing things not-there,鈥� he thinks, 鈥渁nd hearing things not-there since the explosion inside his head.鈥�

Cressida鈥檚 disappearance becomes linked in his mind to the horrors he witnessed in Iraq and the police interrogations start blending in his mind with earlier ones. The entire town, led by Cressida鈥檚 father Zeno, is convinced Kincaid must have done something to the girl. The first 100 pages or so start out as a fairly standard procedural mystery. Then the novel turns abruptly, jumping ahead seven years and landing with claws extended.

Cressida鈥檚 absence casts a shadow over the lives of other characters. Unhappy, maladjusted, and horribly jealous of her pretty older sister, as a teen, she took refuge in art, obsessively creating M.C. Escher-like drawings.鈥淚nside her was a clockwork mechanism wound tight, tight, and ever tighter 鈥� ticktickticking close to bursting,鈥� Oates writes.聽She refused to smile in pictures, saying that one of them would be used for her obituary, her mother, Arlette, remembers while gathering photos of the missing girl to pass around to the media.

In an example of horrible parenting, Juliet was labeled the 鈥減retty one鈥� and Cressida was the 鈥渟mart one鈥� 鈥� with predictable results.

鈥淭he Mayfield girls were like the daughters of a fairy-tale king,鈥� Oates writes. 鈥淏itterly the younger daughter resented the fact 鈥� (if it was a fact, it was unprovable) 鈥� that the father loved the elder, more beautiful daughter more than he loved her, whose twisty little heart he couldn鈥檛 master.鈥�

In Oates鈥檚 fiction, teenage girls can be among the most vindictive, lethal characters out there. Cressida would indulge in small acts of revenge, such as snipping the threads insider her sister鈥檚 cashmere sweater so it would slowly unravel.

After she didn鈥檛 come home, her father searched for her until he passed out from fatigue. But Zeno also doesn鈥檛 think of his youngest child in complimentary terms. 鈥淒ifficult鈥� is among the more charitable adjectives. 鈥淪teeped in the ink of irony as if in the womb.鈥�

鈥淚t was like Cressida to laugh in your face. Squinch up her face like a wicked little monkey,鈥� Zeno thinks of his disappeared daughter. 鈥淗er laughter was high-pitched like a monkey鈥檚 chittering and her small shiny-black eyes were merry with derision.鈥�

The decay inside a picture-perfect American family is a familiar theme for Oates and upstate New York is her old literary stomping grounds. 鈥淐arthage鈥� is a knotted, difficult book 鈥� as dark and twisty as its vanished main character.

Yvonne Zipp, the Monitor fiction critic, lives in Kalamazoo.