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The Vaults (2010)

by Toby Ball(Favorite Author)

3.36 of 5 Votes: 4

ISBN

0312580738 (ISBN13: 9780312580735)

languge

English

genre

Historical Fiction

publisher

St. Martin's Press

review 1: The City, which has no other name, purports to be in 1930s America, but there is an unreality about it that makes it feel like science fiction. It's important, though, that it takes place in the 30s, because it is low tech. All the records are on paper. The Police Department keeps files on all the criminals and criminal activity, which are stored on stacks in a huge underground vault. Arthur Puskis has devoted his life to archiving this massive database (before it would have been called a database). He has mastered its arcane organizational system. He can glean meaning from the age of the paper and the color of the ink. One day in the performance of his duties, he discovers two files, identical in information, but one is a newer copy of the other, and contains a photo of a... more different man. What can this mean? It should not be. So begins the unraveling of a mystery that will include blackmail, intimidation, bombings, kidnappings, murder and threatened murder, gun chases, and fire. Red Henry, former prize-fighter turned autocratic mayor, runs the city with the help of his three industrialist cronies. Something rotten is going on, something besides the Mayor's everyday abuse of power. Puskis has started to ask questions. Soon a private eye named Poole, and a reporter named Frings will be asking questions. As all three converge on the truth, the perpetrators race to cover their trail by altering the records in the vaults. (Remember 1984, when the guy alters old news stories, and drops the old ones into a slot in the wall that drops them into a fire?) On the surface, the questions are: What is going on? Who will die? Will the truth come out in time? And will it make any difference? Behind that are the questions: What is the meaning of the historical record, our collective memory? Is there a pattern to be gleaned from it? And if there is no pattern, is there no God? I liked the action, and I liked the note of strangeness. I initially found keeping track of all the many names challenging (and many of those names had a note of strangeness). I agreed with some reviewers that the Big Reveal seemed not all that big of a deal. The casual violence of the Mayor's regime, however, and its disregard for the humanity of the poor, that is a crime.
review 2: This was a pretty short novel for me - only about 300 pages - and I really enjoyed the dystopian/corruption themes of it placed in a semi-historical setting. That said, I feel like more explanation was needed about the background of crime in the City and just how big a role corruption played in organized crime. This might just be my inherent grasping for detail, but I feel slightly unsatisfied at the finish. less

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