134. His Bloody Project
Rating: ☆☆☆☆
Recommended by:
Author: Graeme Macrae Burnet
Genre: Fiction, Crime
280 pages, published November 5, 2015
Reading Format: E-Book on Overdrive
Summary
A brutal triple murder in a remote Scottish farming community in 1869 leads to the arrest of seventeen-year-old Roderick “Roddy” Macrae. While there is no question that Macrae committed this terrible crime, the authorities are puzzled as to why such a shy and intelligent boy would go down this bloody path? Presented as a collection of documents discovered by the author, His Bloody Project opens with a series of police statements taken from the villagers of Culdie, Rossshire. They offer conflicting impressions of the accused; one interviewee recalls Macrae as a gentle and quiet child, while another details him as evil and wicked. Among the papers is Roddy’s own memoirs, where he outlines the series of events leading up to the murder in eloquent and affectless prose. The book also contains medical reports, psychological evaluations, a courtroom transcript from the trial, and other documents that throw both Macrae’s motive and his sanity into question.
Quotes
“One man can no more see into the mind of another than he can see inside a stone…”
“These unfortunates are distinguished by the prevalence of malicious feelings, which often arise at the most trivial provocation. They see enmity where none exists and indulge themselves in great fantasies of revenge and mischief; fantasies which they are then powerless to resist acting upon.”
My Take
I decided to read His Bloody Project after seeing that it was a Man Booker Prize Nominee in 2016. The format of the book as a collection of documents surrounding a triple murder, investigation and trial in 17th Century Scotland made for a fascinating read, especially as it revealed details of the different social classes of the time. After finishing it, I still had some questions about what exactly happened, but I think that is the point of the book. Life is often messy and incomprehensible. Although we would like to put people and events into neat little boxes, it is sometimes impossible to do that and we have to live with the ambiguity.