There’s a terrific opening to Christopher Ridley’s KILL ME NOW, a noir-esque tale of the life and death of Damien. A posthumous narration opens the novel, detailing how this gay man living the high life in Los Angeles came to be killed out on the streets of the Hollywood Hills dressed only in his underwear and a flowered kimono. It’s witty, strewn with catty remarks, and packed with references to pop culture. Even as he is being assailed, Damien seems more concerned about his outfit than his fate: “Embarrassingly the first thought I had—other than ouch—was I hope this doesn’t ruin my kimono. It tears incredibly easily and was such a pain to order from China.”
Post-mortem, the narrative switches to various other characters recounting their experiences with the deceased. These include his boss, multiple exes, his best friend, and even his cat Stanley Kowalski—though the cat’s testimony consists almost entirely of variations of “purr” and “meow.” With each new character comes a new chapter, a change in font, a change in syntax. Later there are even emojis. It is never expressly clear who all of these first person narrators are addressing: an unseen investigator, or merely the reader? They are mostly defensive statements, each explaining how they couldn’t have been directly involved in Damien’s death. There is even a surprise appearance by Sarah Michelle Gellar, conjured perhaps by the numerous references in the text to the Scream movie. She is very clear that she couldn’t have had anything to do with Damien’s death.
All of this leans into the “Rashomon effect,” wherein different unreliable narrators recount a particular event, though here Ridley uses multiple voices to inspect the lead character’s personality more than his actual death. Indeed, the suggestion that somehow the reader might be able to deduce the killer is rather stymied by the narrators’ inability to ever stick to the point of their tales. There’s an awful lot of waffle, admittedly much of it humorous. But ultimately these digressions nullify any real drama or chance to build a gripping plot. As Damien himself says, speaking to the reader from the afterlife: “Wow you guys. Is it just me, or are they all more interested in talking shit than trying to figure out who murdered me?”
As a satire, KILL ME NOW is reasonably successful. It is generally well written, and Ridley has a sharp eye for the more ridiculous elements of contemporary pop culture. Unfortunately, the gripping opening is never really built upon; the smart structure that would have allowed a more coherent, driven narrative to emerge is never really exploited. Each chapter has bright moments, and the book is never dull, but a tighter grip on how to slowly reveal a story would have delivered a more satisfying whole.
Christopher Ridley’s KILL ME NOW is a fun read filled with pop culture references and camp, cutting humor.
~Kent Lane for IndieReader