Not that that means we suddenly know everything about him. Though the whole series has been retroactively dubbed the Pendergast series, and though Pendergast certainly played a critical role in Relic and Reliquary, this is the first book where it really does become his series. (I have, if it hasn’t become apparent yet, quite a soft spot for Bill Smithback). And of course, Bill’s running around, picking up pieces of information, helping Pendergast in unexpected ways, and generally pissing off every authority figure he encounters.
Nonetheless, Pendergast enlists the aid and wins the loyalty of policeman Patrick Murphy O’Shaughnessy - originally assigned as a liaison to try and slow Pendergast down, but who quickly joins in the hunt, feeling reinvigorated in his career by the detective work. She and Pendergast are thwarted consistently: by Nora’s boss at the Museum, who doesn’t want her involved, by Anthony Fairhaven, the developer who owns the land on which the 130-year-old bodies were found, and by the New York Mayor’s office, who don’t want them upsetting Fairhaven, a significant political contributor. She serves more or less the same function as Margo Green, but she’s a character with a bit more bite to her. (They meet in a spinoff novel, Thunderhead, which I was going to read ahead of this book before I realised I don’t actually own it). The female lead and primary research in this book is Nora Kelly, girlfriend of Bill Smithback. Though the NYPD considers these copycats to be inspired by the news about the archaeological site (and blames reporter Bill Smithback for breaking the story), Pendergast insists that the connection is far more direct and important than that. This alone would be a fairly compelling story, but what really gets the attention of our usual assembly of heroes is when “copycat” crimes start popping up in New York City - men and women attacked and brutalized, part of their spinal cord removed, while they’re still alive. The skeletons are testament to America’s most prolific serial killer - whose crimes had never before been revealed or even suspected. In The Cabinet of Curiosities, construction for a new building unearths a gruesome charnal house, over a hundred years old. This feels more like an old-time Victorian mystery - not least because the book takes a couple of speculative dips back in time. The sci-fi twist isn’t the point, and it doesn’t set the mood.
Despite the sci-fi element being more genuinely plausibility-straining and utterly critical to the story, you don’t feel it for most of the book. The Cabinet of Curiosities is one of the more sophisticated and subtle of the Pendergast thrillers. Author: Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
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