{"id":18250,"date":"2023-08-29T07:00:08","date_gmt":"2023-08-29T11:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/?p=18250"},"modified":"2023-08-21T22:44:37","modified_gmt":"2023-08-22T02:44:37","slug":"bev-vincent-explores-holly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cemeterydance.com\/extras\/bev-vincent-explores-holly\/","title":{"rendered":"Bev Vincent explores Holly by Stephen King"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Stephen<\/p>\n

\n

“No one will believe it really happened”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Stephen King doesn\u2019t hide the identity of the murderers at the center of Holly Gibney\u2019s latest case in the novel that bears her name. In 2012, Emily and Rodney Harris, professors emeritus at Bell College, tricked a colleague named Jorge Castro into helping them resolve a roadside issue. They drugged him and took him to a dungeon in the basement of their presentable home in a respectable part of town.<\/p>\n

Why did the elderly Harrises kidnap him, why do they force him to eat something unpalatable, and what are their plans? Since Castro knows the identity of his abductors, it doesn\u2019t seem likely he\u2019ll be released. The popular consensus is that he packed up and left town abruptly, although his lover doesn\u2019t agree.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>In 2021, Penelope Dahl hires Holly to find her missing daughter, Bonnie Rae Dahl. Because Bonnie is in her mid-twenties, the police aren\u2019t taking her disappearance seriously. Her bicycle was found abandoned with a note attached to the seat that indicates she left of her own free will. The police department is overworked and understaffed, the latter due to the coronavirus pandemic that is in full swing. The city is also reeling from the officer-involved death of a black man and its aftermath, reminiscent of many other similar incidents in recent history.<\/p>\n

Holly Gibney, who was introduced in Mr. Mercedes<\/em> and was most recently seen in the novella \u201cIf It Bleeds\u201d in the collection of the same name[1]<\/a>, is the perfect character to drop into the middle of a pandemic. She is a self-confessed hypochondriac and germophobe who believes the virus could be on any surface she touches; however, she follows the science. She\u2019s fully vaccinated, always wears a mask, refuses handshakes, wears surgical gloves when handling things and probably buys hand sanitizer by the gallon. She\u2019s fully aware that the fact that she\u2019s smoking again is a contradiction.<\/p>\n

As the book opens, Holly is attending her mother\u2019s funeral\u2026on Zoom. Her mother was a supporter of the former occupant of the White House and a Covid denier, even though it was the virus that killed her. As I wrote in my essay Facing Reality<\/a>, King captures a moment in history that might otherwise fade from memory. \u201cWhen this is over,\u201d Holly muses, \u201cno one will believe it really happened. Or if they do, they won\u2019t understand how<\/em> it happened.\u201d Years from now (hopefully), the pandemic will seem like a bad dream, but this novel will serve as a time capsule, reminding readers of greetings that involve which vaccine each person has received, whether it\u2019s okay to remove their masks, awkward elbow bumps. Holly<\/em> also touches on other current events: the January 6 insurrection, accusations of a stolen election, Black Live Matters and the #MeToo movement.<\/p>\n

Holly\u2019s colleague, Pete Huntley, who was Bill Hodges\u2019 former partner in the police department, is quarantining with Covid. He is vaccinated, but the virus is still kicking his butt. Holly\u2019s family loss and Pete\u2019s illness mean Finder\u2019s Keepers is temporarily closed—like a lot of businesses during the pandemic—but Holly can\u2019t turn down the Dahl case, so she embarks on a solo investigation, occasionally calling upon her friends Jerome and Barbara Robinson for research assistance. Jerome is somewhat distracted because he\u2019s turning his college research paper into a book. Barbara is also involved in a literary endeavor with a promising outcome. Still, despite these distractions, the siblings gather evidence and make connections—Jerome in a poignant pair of scenes involving the mother of one of the victims. Each person has a different piece of the puzzle, though, and it takes them a while to share their individual discoveries with each other.<\/p>\n