Review: Seven Down by David Whitton

The introductory note from the author in a work of fiction is, quite often, something I skim over or forget immediately after reading. However, David Whitton's fun blurb on the weirdness of secret services operations was a perfect introduction to this book all about an operation that goes horribly wrong in a number of small ways. It had me ready for a Burn After Reading-type novel, and what followed didn't disappoint.

Seven Down is a series of interviews with seven different operatives working at a hotel where an assassination should have been carried out, puppet-mastered by the mysterious 'Company'. Something small and stupid (or big and stupid) appears to have altered the operation in each account, until the reader is shown just what a clusterfuck the operation turned out to be.

I'm very fond of multiple-narrative books, and I really enjoyed the different voices and different situations of each of the operatives. Taking up a similar format and repeating the same story seven times, it would be easy for the novel to become repetitive. But the different environments, the different ways the operatives are treated, gave enough flavour to the narrative to keep it interesting.

The real fun of the book comes in piecing together the total story of what really happened. Each account knows only their portion, with no awareness even of who else was an operative carrying out instructions on that day. We are therefore given the story in Ikea-style flat-pack, which it is the reader's job to slot together. I personally was left with one or two screws and funny wooden pegs left over, not entirely sure which hole they should go in or what they were for, but this might be because I was reading the story in a piecemeal way over a long period.

Seven Down is an interesting exercise in butterfly effects -- seeing how one small mishap leads to a larger one, until the whole thing snowballs into a disaster. The writing is engaging, and the formatting of the story carefully thought out. I really enjoyed reading it.

Seven Down by David Whitton can be ordered here.

With thanks to the publishers and Netgalley.com for providing an e-advanced review copy.