The Open Ocean

In a novel that unfolds as a mystery thriller before revealing that in the end mystery persists, questions remain, and solutions always prove ironic, the ocean symbolizes the intoxicating beauty of such openness, the abiding and alluring thrill of mystery itself. The novel begins and ends with a kind of panoramic, Panavision move into the island of Saint X that centers on a lingering description, presumably by Claire, of the open ocean: the “a moment, a vista, a spectacle of color so sudden and intense it delivers a feeling like plunging a cube of ice into warm water and watching it shatter” (1). The shimmering azure, punctuated by the outlines of distant tankers and cruise ships, suggests the sublime wonder of openness. Set against the islands, the network of cays and inlets and dormant volcanoes, and the archipelago of posh resorts that dot the island...