Ashley Boettcher’s Threshold represents an ambitious undertaking for a first time novelist. The book weaves together an alternate American military and political history with a secret-agent mystery tale involving a threatened presidential assassination. Also, she provides a gently humorous slice of teen and family social life, interspersed with a mystical element complete with real-life Sirens and ancient evils gowned witches hide away from otherworldly flames.
Even with the fate of the civilized world at stake, Boettcher’s characters fight to avoid detentions, develop crushes on each other, and resent that their little kid brothers get assigned the most exciting parts of the investigation. Boettcher’s observant eye for the idealism and insecurity of the teenage psyche allows her to create coherent main characters and scenes which drive the story forward. Meanwhile, the beauty of the otherworldly, magical scenes take the narrative outside of its high-school confines, connecting the tale to larger spiritual and moral dramas.
The best mystery novels allow readers to piece together clues along with fictional investigators, solving the puzzle right before the character makes his or her final ‘Aha!’ pronouncement. Threshold considers itself a mystery, as the novel jumps among plot threads and freezes its characters at precise moments of suspense. Especially in the first half, however, readers are still working out the alternate history and likely will not catch the significance of certain clues. The effective pacing and authentic rhythm and dialogue of the piece works well for a suspense thriller. And the entire piece could be strengthened by ‘setting the stage’ beforehand through a prologue or some telling details, so readers may focus on the unfolding drama of the killer’s stalking the President and the detectives without attempting to grasp two mysteries at once.
Also, some of the novel’s plot points, while imaginative, seem fantastical. And not the ones involving Sirens, exorcism, prophecies and science-fiction cloning/eugenics from the secretive Society. Those actually create a supernatural mood of mystical horror where arguing over the feasibility of details becomes less necessary. And the notes from the assassin, slightly tedious at the beginning while completely inexplicable, foreshadow a chilling, Hamlet-like exploration of obsession and post-traumatic stress syndrome and the healing role of faith.
Some of the real-life, modern-day scenes feel not quite real: two teens unearthing the President’s family secrets ‘on the Internet,’ the young detectives’ hiding in a trunk and surviving a car bomb, the eventual escape of the ‘copycat’ killer with a pen. Threshold could be strengthened by ensuring the technical feasibility of the ‘real-life’ scenes through researching and then subtly weaving details into the narrative to convey that knowledge.
Threshold presents a stark contrast between good and evil, life and death, love and terror. Perhaps this is the novel’s greatest strength – we see life in all its confusing glory, humanity in all its manifestations, posited as the antithesis to a one-dimensional secret society obsessed with power and death.
Hopefully Boettcher will continue writing, playing to her strengths with the help of qualified editors.
n Ashley Boettcher’s Threshold is an upcoming novel, available in present form directly from the author – who may be reached at Ashley.boettcher@gmail.com.