Pure (2011)

Synopsis
A year of bones, of grave-dirt, relentless work. Of mummified corpses and chanting priests.

A year of rape, suicide, sudden death. Of friendship too. Of desire. Of love...

A year unlike any other he has lived.

Deep in the heart of Paris, its oldest cemetery is, by 1785, overflowing, tainting the very breath of those who live nearby. Into their midst comes Jean-Baptiste Baratte, a young, provincial engineer charged by the king with demolishing it.

At first Baratte sees this as a chance to clear the burden of history, a fitting task for a modern man of reason. But before long, he begins to suspect that the destruction of the cemetery might be a prelude to his own. ( )

Better than a 3, not quite as good as a 4 in my book. I must admit that I could not put it down, though. ( )

The stink of the Innocents is permeating the soil, the water, and the air of Paris. The rotting remains of the overstuffed cemetery of les Innocents are leaching into the food and even the very skin and breath of the living inhabitants of the surrounding city. The vast yard of bones and soupy remains is eroding into their cellars. So the King's minister has hired on an engineer from Normandy to put together a crew that will dig up and relocate the corpses to the Catacombs, then destroy the cemetery and the church.
This is a sumptuous and evocative story of late 18th century Paris. It is as if Andrew Miller himself just came back from 1785 and is eagerly regaling us with all that he saw. We are jostled by the crowds in the streets and the rough labourers in the cemetery, we smell the fetid air, we feel the grit beneath our feet and between our fingers, we peer into the dim candle-lit shadows of hovels, church recesses, and charnel houses.

Eeeeww factoid: Scientific American provided a fascinating article on the history of this cemetery. The cemetery was so crowded that not enough oxygen was available for decomposition, so mounds of fat resulted. This human fat was turned into soaps and candles.
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/anecdotes-from-the-archive/2011/04/15/you-po... ( )

I enjoy books like this one, ones that focus not on shoving obstacles and enemies into the path of the plot, but instead work to give the main character friendship, fortune, and even love despite their misfortunes. There's just something satisfying in seeing characters work effectively with one another, together dealing with all that life throws at them. In other words, I'm a fan of authors who don't make all their characters insufferable prats just because they can. It's easy to get weary of the antagonism.
Living close to a large cemetery myself, I have to appreciate how far we've come in dealing with our buried dead. The idea of that pervasive malaise, in the air, in the food, in the people. It's disgustingly frightening on a base level, a feeling only matched by the thought of living near a radioactive zone. If Ziguette's antics weren't related to that decaying cesspool, I'll eat my hat.
Going back to the characters actually being decent with one another, I was surprised by how many of them were competent souls. Definitely led to less drama. There wasn't any cringing at misplaced trust or outdated medicinal techniques, or even lover's spats. It was instead borderline peaceful, save for a few incidents; rape, attempted murder, suicide, arson, and all that jazz. Despite all these, the book went along at an enjoyably sedate pace, as it made up its lack of action with more than enough descriptive power. I'll take realistic imagery that I can fully immerse myself in over overly complex power plays any day.
( )

As the two stars denote, this book was okay. That's about it. You aren't really asked to have any feelings for the characters, some of what may be the most interesting parts of the story are written so vaguely that you can't be sure what really happened, and the story just tended to "happen." The only plot of the story was for the engineer to remove the graveyard and church. Beyond the story itself, the writing style was mildly irritating. Throughout the book, on every page, the author uses commas rather than the word "and," as if he was taught that this was the proper way to do it. Sometimes it is done just to repeat what is said using different wording. While not wrong, it did get on my nerves because it made the reading very choppy and difficult. It also seemed that he did not know the meaning or usage of some words, such as "What baroques even a mind like his is capable of." Now, I know what baroque means, and it can tend to be vague, but I just can't make it fit in this sentence. This was not the only instance of words just not fitting. I bought this for my Kindle, and will be deleting it. It was not good enough to ever read again. ( )