That J.K. Rowling successfully managed to convict an author for plagiarism of her little booklet Harry Potter is a bitter joke and an ultimate case of irony, considering that Rowling's work is little more than a compendium of nicked ideas. Not in the least the work of Anthony Horowitz, successful author of both books and tv work for both children and adults.
Horowitz's latest novel (for adults) is The Killing Joke and opens with a man who goes into a bar... The novel's tagline is "Making jokes is no laughing matter" and one doesn't even have to be Watson to know the subplot of this book: jokes.
Guy Fletcher is an actor who hears an unfunny joke, protests against the joke and is subsequently beaten up by the jokers. Guy has two reasons for protesting against the joke: 1) He is in a bad mood because his girlfriend has left him and 2) he knows the woman the joke was about.
Guy, who has always been curious about the weirdest things, suddenly wonders: who ever thought of this cruel joke? Fletcher decides to follow the trail of the joke, hopeful to trace the origin of the joke. But it isn't before long that the reader is informed by the narrator that this may not have been Guy's best idea in years. There is something about the joke that certain people don't want Guy Fletcher to discover.
The Killing Joke is more than a novel. As more than one reviewer has already mentioned, the cleverly plotted novel is brimful of jokes and suspense, the combination of two elements which have always been important keys of Horowitz's books.
But it is more than that: in a way one could state that The Killing Joke is the anatomy of a joke. It makes you wonder about jokes while you're on the road with Guy, following the trail of the joke and wondering why certain people are behind him.
The book is a fun-packed ride and displays many forms of jokes, elaborately interwoven in the plot. The absurder joke variant poses a problem though: the book might fail the reader who takes The Killing Joke a bit too seriously. Certain amateur reviewers were disappointed by the way the story develops, though they shouldn't be: Horowitz cleverly construed the book as a joke and persists in telling the narrative as an extended joke. The only problem is that jokes aren't meant to be 300 pages long, which might raise a few questions about the target audience. Will Horowitz's readership (mostly parents of children who'll try an adult novel themselves or fans of his tv work) get the construction of the book (and as I mentioned earlier, this is a key element in understanding and appreciating the book)? Or is this a book which is better enjoyed by those having studied literature (but as we all know, how many of those academics are capable of taking the narrative not too serious?). Yes, The Killing Joke may not attract the same crowds as The Da Vinci Code or, here we go again, Harry Potter, but for those failing to understand the book, just wait for The Rough Guide to The Killing Joke to appear.
For those in for a joke: have a laugh...
P.S. It has been stated by some that this was Horowitz's first novel for adults. Dutch and Flemish readers will know this is simply not true: a novel called William S. appeared a few years ago on the Dutch market and marked the official debut of Anthony Horowitz as a novelist for an adult audience. The book was not published in England because the editors wondered whether a writer of children's fiction could sell books for a maturer audience too. That Horowitz had already written many plots for detective shows on tv, was something the British editors hadn't noticed.