A vet turns to fight the past that dogs him

A Novel

Christopher Rice

Scribner: 290 pp., $26

Blind Fall

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Christopher RICE’S fourth novel, “Blind Fall,” is something of a departure, even as it continues to explore the complex terrain of his earlier, bestselling work. Both “A Density of Souls” (2000) and “The Snow Garden” (2001) mined the secret histories of high school and college students in Donna Tartt-like fashion, while “Light Before Day” (2005) was a somewhat messy amalgam of serial-killer thriller, ruminations on writing and a look at methamphetamine addiction among gay men in West Hollywood.

“Blind Fall” eschews the lushness of the openly gay Rice’s earlier work for a tighter focus on all facets of darkness concealed by a closeted mentality, whether it applies to a straight or gay person.

Iraq war veteran John Houck may sleep exclusively with women, but he’s still ruled by what’s inside his own closet, filled with years of compartmentalization about the most important events in his life. The guilt he feels over his younger brother Dean’s death, the uncomfortably ambiguous truth about Dean’s teenage relationship with a teacher and John’s estrangement from older sister Patsy are sealed away with his decision to join the military.

Houck acknowledges that his overseas deployment is an attempt to trade family-related failures for heroic patriotism, but as Rice shows in an emotion-filled opening scene, Houck has room for one more torment: the blame he takes on after an explosive device detonates and maims his company captain, Mike Bowers, with whom he shares an iron-clad bond forged in combat.

Upon his return to civilian life near Twentynine Palms, Houck caves in to the “message that had been telegraphed to him day after day in Iraq: go help someone who wants it,” and he decides to seek absolution from his former captain.

But when he arrives at Bowers’ isolated house, Houck instead stumbles upon his mutilated corpse and signs of the homosexual orientation the captain kept secret from his military cohorts. Both discoveries compound Houck’s guilt and play havoc with his assumptions, but the definitive emptying of his emotional armoire doesn’t begin until his path intersects with Bowers’ younger, impulsive civilian lover, Alex Martin.

Closets also figure prominently in Martin’s life. The pain of coming out cost Martin a privileged education and parental support, but embracing his homosexuality gained him a lover and a stable life conducted far away from city limits. “Funny how you finally make a decision and everything gets so simple that it feels like you’ve never made a decision before in your entire life,” Martin tells Houck. The sentiment applies equally to his choice of partner as it does to the uneasy alliance he and Houck form in a joint mission to ferret out the truth of Bowers’ murder.

Their initial interactions operate on a somewhat shrill setting, but as Houck takes it upon himself to train Martin for the violence that surely looms ahead, Rice settles into a solid groove of tension and brutality, depicted best when Martin pulls away Houck’s hero mantle and reveals the fabric of a bond woven in extreme situations. As “Blind Fall” inverts the reader’s expectation with a conclusion that is equal parts throwback and contemporary, it also shows that man’s greatest fear can be the corruption of masculinity by any means.

The claustrophobic homophobia that Rice depicts in a wide-open, remote setting makes “Blind Fall” a disquieting antidote to the openness about sexuality that many are accustomed to, providing a strong theme for the advancement of the novel’s suspense elements. It also enables Rice to transcend too many clunky “had I but known” phrases, plot turns requiring a strong suspension of disbelief and an occasional tendency toward exposition, especially clear in an almost stand-alone chapter depicting the beginnings of Martin and Bowers’ relationship.

Rice’s key point is that the phrase “Don’t ask, don’t tell” -- made famous by the Clinton administration’s awkwardly ambivalent stance on gays in the military 15 years ago -- applies to all secrets. Resentment can be its own closet, trapping such positive human emotions as loyalty, platonic love and empathy and masking negative traits such as greed, jealousy and shame. “Blind Fall” not only asks John Houck, Alex Martin and others to accept their true selves, no matter how painful that process may be, but also asks the reader to always ask and to always tell, no matter how strong the urge to resist.

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Sarah Weinman writes Dark Passages, an online monthly mystery and suspense column, for latimes.com. She blogs about crime and mystery fiction at www.sarah weinman.com.