Following the success of “Moxyland” and “Zoo City,” South African author Lauren Beukes has created another incredible magical realism novel, The Shining Girls.
The city? Chicago. The year? Well, that’s another story.
Harper Curtis, a Depression-era drifter, stumbles across a key to a mysterious house (or House, as it is personified in the novel ) that allows him to visit other times. On his first visit he is accosted with a dead body and a multitude of girls names written in his own hand. However, on his travels through time Curtis becomes obsessed with what he calls his “shining girls” – beautiful, intelligent, woman with great potential; from a dancer in the 1930s to an intelligent architect in the 1950s – they all share a “shine”. The House desires them, and Harper must comply. He moves smoothly through the decades until, in 1989, one shining girl survives.
The lone survivor, Kirby Mazrachi, drags a reluctant reporter into an investigation into her own attack, while dredging up the murders of other woman in Chicago from the past. Something about them seems connected, but the timeline just doesn’t add up. A 1951 baseball card found in a victim’s pocket in 1943. Objects that don’t belong to the victim they are found on, objects that could not have been there. As the clues start to come together, Kirby cannot help but come to the conclusion that the murders were all performed by the same person, but one thing is for sure, that would be impossible.
The Shining Girls is a fantastic example of Lauren Beukes’s ability to create immersive urban fantasy, where the real and unreal blend in a city familiar to us, and yet incredibly unfamiliar. Her characters reveal great depths, and despite the dark subject matter a smattering of comedy arises in the relationship between Kirby and crime reporter Dan Velazquez. The characters are believable, no nonsense, and draw you into a beautiful but terrifying play on the strengths and weaknesses of human nature.
Though today we are faced with an abundance of serial killer narratives and crime stories, The Shining Girls puts together the premise for the perfect murder, giving the killer a foolproof method to escape conviction, and the ability to leave clues that ask only more questions. Despite the move away from her typical South African setting, Beukes proves once again that the city itself is not important to the story, but it is instead the personal relationships, and interconnectedness of daily life that plays the most important role in any narrative.
Francesca Sleet 