Book Review : Sam Wiebe - Ocean Drive (2024)
Sam Wiebe's novels are a very particular kind of pleasure. They're cerebral, but quietly heartfelt. Gritty, but never all-out "tough guy" fiction and they explore thoroughly Canadian social and territorial issues. It's a precise thing. A detective fiction expert by trade, Wiebe stepped outside of his comfort zone with his new novel Ocean Drive, a more conventional police procedural/thriller and while his writing is undeniably solid and confident, you kind of feel this discomfort a little bit. At least, long time fans will.
Ocean Drive tells the story of Cameron Shaw, a murderer on parole who's tasked by a shadowy lawyer to infiltrate a local gang and Meghan Quick, the staff sergeant of the quiet, privileged community of White Rock (where Shaw committed his deed), who's investigating an arson and murder. Both people are just distant memories to one another, but fate and shadowy forces bigger than both of them have put Cameron and Meghan on collision course once again for better or worse. But mostly worse.
The Upward Trajectory of Money
There are several antagonists in Ocean Drive, but they’re all driven by a single overarching villain that ties the narrative together : money or the prospect of. Now, it's hardly a new idea in crime fiction to talk about how money corrupts even the purest souls, but Wiebe adds his own quirky twist to it. The prospect of a casino being built in the little community of White Rock pumps enormous sums of money upwards, from underground and illegal contest into the "harmless and respectable" community and triggering the absolute fucking worse in everyone.
When such a phenomenon happens in a small town like White Rock, there's always a halo of collateral damage and it’s what Cameron and Meghan are grappling with both, from their respective side of the line separating "normal" society from the underworld. Bodies surface, inexplicable violence flares up. A once immovable landscapes starts to shift quickly and drastically. True to himself, Wiebe shows a solid command of twists and timing to pull you along without ever making you feel duped. He also never feels the need to wrap it up nicely.
Sam Wiebe (the person and the writer) is a realist at heart, so none of his novels ever ends up the way big budget movies do. There are always loose ends. Always someone getting away with it somehow. No one ever leaves unscathed. Even if the thrills in Ocean Drive are more conventional than what he’s previously gotten us used to, they’re still delivered with great dynamism and a keen understanding of the mechanics of drama. You think that you know where it’s going, but Wiebe always keeps his cards close enough to keep you guessing.
Gangbangin’ in Wonderland
I gotta admit though, Cameron Shaw a weak spot of Ocean Drive and it was a problem given that he’s one of the two protagonists. The guy himself is cool and feeds into the stereotypical cagey, distrustful, down-on-his-luck realistic young man that Wiebe is so good at writing, but it’s what he’s involved in that’s pretty crazy. A young, directionless guy who was never involved with gangs previously becomes a hardcore UNDERCOVER gangbanger that does crimes you’d see at the end of a Grand Theft Auto game within a hundred pages?
That rubbed me the wrong way somehow. I understand that it’s Sam Wieve taking a chance and exploring new territories, but I thought it clashed with the overall tone of the novel and, independently of Ocean Drive, I find that big, fast moving action scenes just aren’t that fun to read in general. It’s hard to make them convey tension and character through action. I mean it’s not impossible, but it doesn’t work in Ocean Drive and it doesn’t work in most novels. You might like it, but this aspect didn’t work for me.
*
At the end of the day, Ocean Drive is a summer read. It’s a novel with a far wider commercial appeal that what Sam Wiebe had done so far and it’s probably going to be received accordingly. The nerd stuff I care about is not what most audiences care about, but if you’re reading this site, you’re somewhat of a nerd too and I’d say you’re more likely to enjoy Sam Wiebe’s Dave Wakeland novels than Ocean Drive. At least it’s what I think. It’s what I felt. This is not a bad novel by any means, it just has less personality that Sam Wiebe’s previous two.
