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Chilling Debut Novel Mimics Shakespeare's 'Hamlet'

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By ESTHER HAMMER

The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 31, 2008

"Undiscovered Country," by Lin Enger (Little, Brown and Co., $24)

In his debut novel, Lin Enger presents an absorbing tale of murder and vengeance. When young Jesse's father is found shot to death during a hunting trip, the coroner rules it a suicide. But Jesse thinks differently.

Grief-stricken and convinced his father would never kill himself, Jesse believes it's murder, and for many reasons comes to believe his uncle Clay, the dead man's brother, did it. After all, Clay courted his mother before his father came along and has not been as successful in any area of his life as Jesse's father.

In fact, Clay is a loser. And now that Jesse's dad is gone, his uncle seems to be getting pretty chummy with the mother.

Sound familiar? It's Hamlet all over again, and Jesse begins to see the parallels and to take them seriously after his father's ghost rises up out of the water one night and speaks to him.

"Listen, Jesse!" it says. "You can't allow this to stand. You can't let him do this, do you hear me? There's no one else, just you. ... And don't tell your mother ... It wouldn't be safe."

Jesse's friend Charlie, a Shakespeare buff, tries to dissuade Jesse from making any comparisons, but Jesse is convinced and believes that Clay killed his father.

The novel is written in the first person and its tone is solemn yet resolute, moving briskly forward as Jesse searches for ways to convince the authorities of Clay's guilt, or, failing that, of ways to secure vengeance on his own. Along the way, some uncomfortable family history is revealed.

Set in the wintry landscape of northern Minnesota, the story is as chilling as the locale, and makes for a good first novel.

Esther Hammer is a Tribune correspondent.

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