Book Review : Christopher Irvin - Burn Cards (2015)

Order BURN CARDS here

(also reviewed)
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I have been reading compulsively for so many years now (haven't run out of something to read since 2003), that my reasons for reading are clear to me: I am constantly searching for the Holy Grail. The blessing and the curse of readers like me is that we find what we're looking for more than once in a lifetime (usually once a year or so), yet once the first reading of special book is over, the only choice is to continue our quest, because it's the only way we'll keep rekindling that healing symbiosis with literature. BURN CARDS, by Christopher Irvin was fascinating to me for the wrong reasons: it doesn't seem to know what it has to offer to the reader and therefore it somewhat failed to get a reaction out of me despite being rather competent.

Mirna was born an raised in Reno, Nevada, a city that never liked her. She lives with her degenerate gambler father Doug, for whom she provides by working at a hair salon. The inevitable finally happens one day, she finds her father dead in their apartment, and his collectors transfer his sizable debt to her. Mirna ends up alone against a well-oiled machine fueled by gambling establishment and although there are no good options for her, she decides to dig into her father's past in order to understand better what's happening to her and, who knows, maybe find a way out of this hopeless town.

There's nothing wrong with BURN CARDS, per se. It's technically competent. I would call it efficient even, if a little too slow at times. The plot is cohesive and well-wrapped and has a couple fun surprises to offer, including a quirky and abstract ending that makes it worth sticking around. Christopher Irvin can obviously write, it's not the issue here. BURN CARDS has, I thought, an issue with linearity that takes away from its potential: it's kind of easy to figure out. It's not surprising. Asking for killer plot twists would be unfair, but what I'm saying is that the characters don't really evolve (Mirna's a victim and remains a victim) and the cast remains more or less the same, and it ends ups being a problem.

If I want to start splitting hairs, I would question the setting (Reno) which I think isn't all that pertinent to the storyline. BURN CARDS could have been set in every godforsaken town, I believe, I don't think it was even mandatory that it was set in a state where gambling is legal. Irvin makes the best out of his locale though and uses the byzantine nightlife of a gambling town in order to create fun and challenging images that reminded me sometimes of Nicolas Windig Refn's movies. So, it would be unfair to critcize BURN CARDS on its choice of location because although it felt stapled on the storyline, it's actually uses to heighten the aesthetic, which is the novella's best calling card.

The question you're all asking yourself as this review is winding down is: "Ben, fucking make up your mind, should I or shouldn't I read BURN CARDS?" It's not that easy to answer, because BURN CARDS will make you tick only if the theme does: surviving the addiction of a loved one. It's a fairly traditional crime story and clinical look at how addiction destroys lives. Storytelling-wise, BURN CARDS is a tad short on surprises and while there's nothing bad about it per se (Christopher Irvin can tell a story without fucking up), it won't take you places you've never been before. I can't speak for you, but it didn't take me away. The quest for my next Holy Grail continues.