For a start it has everything you could want in a whodunit; guns, drugs and money, extortion, theft and murder, and a plot that is both satisfying, intricate and - provided you pay close attention - solvable. It is also an artistic achievement that will keep literary scholars happily arguing for years.
Set in Hokitika at the height of the gold rush, the story centres around the events of a single day during which former prospector Crosbie Wells is found dead with a fortune in gold concealed in his hut, local prostitute Anna Wetherell overdoses on opium with hundreds of dollars in gold dust sewn into the seams of her dress, and Emery Staines, the richest man in Hokitika, vanishes.
Although not initially clear that a crime has actually been committed, suspicions deepen with the discovery of an unsigned deed of gift for £2000 from Staines to Wetherell (witnessed by Wells), particularly since Wetherell was the last person to see Staines before his disappearance. Then a woman purporting to be Wells' widow arrives to claim his estate, to the detriment of those who gained financially from its initial disposal. From here the intrigue widens in a complex series of connections between characters and events that culminate in a trial in which one version of the truth is presented before looping back through time to reveal the final moments that precede the whole affair.
At more than 800 pages, with multiple plotlines, characters and narrative viewpoints to keep track of, it would be easy for the reader to become frustrated, bored or lost in detail. The fact they do not is testament to Catton's writing skills, particularly her evocative descriptions of the physical setting and the adoption of the literary style of the 1860s, which combine to create a vivid sense of time and place.
A second contributing factor is the intricate structure of the novel. It is divided into a dozen sections that are related by the golden ratio, so the mystery is introduced in a detailed and complicated 357-page exposition and concludes a series of stroboscopic flashes of insight of less than a page, a device that drives the story forward with an increasing sense of urgency and offsets its length.
In addition, the narrators are not only socially and cultural diverse, each embodies a different astrological sign, the nature of which dictates their personalities and relationships, and highlights their individuality.
That is not to say that The Luminaries is perfect; proponents of the ''show don't tell'' approach to writing will be irritated by the fact each character's disposition is described in analytic detail at the start of their narrative, and whilst a summary of events at the end of the first section is welcome, it seems slightly staged. Similarly, the brevity of the final parts is partly achieved by shifting most of the plot to the summary that opens each chapter, which feels a bit like cheating.
The sheer size of the book makes it physically hard to read and has also been criticised. But the fact people disagree about the merits of some of Catton's choices is no bad thing; what matters is people care enough to read and debate her work.
- Cushla McKinney is a Dunedin scientist.
