Clason, Clyde B - Green Shiver

Green Shiver (1941) involves collectors of Chinese jade. Every part of the book dealing with Chinese art, culture and philosophy is well done, and makes good reading. Unfortunately, the mystery elements of this book are routine, if elaborate. To his credit, Clason manages to avoid the coincidentally occurring subplots that afflict many lesser Golden Age novels. Instead, his solution manages to link up and explain all the disparate elements of the story as parts of a unified, connected common plot. Towards the end of his novel, Clason introduces what Alfred Hitchcock called a McGuffin. Clason uses this to motivate the actions of many of the characters. It is not quite clear if a McGuffin, introduced towards the end of a book, is quite fair play or not. But it is interesting the way Clason uses it to give hidden meanings and significance to the actions of many of the characters in the book. At the end, we see their behavior in a new light, and this is moderately ingenious.

Green Shiver has a similar structure to the earlier The Man from Tibet (1938). In many ways, this second novel is an extension or variation of the first. Both center around the culture of a particular foreign country: China and Tibet, respectively. Both deal with wealthy American collectors who have a private museum of Asian art in the geometric center of their homes. Both collections contain a valuable stolen cultural object from Asia around which intrigue swirls, and both novels have a distinguished visitor from Asia. Both have frequent flashbacks to turbulent adventure in Asia. Green Shiver is much less linear than The Man from Tibet, and this is a good thing. The reader is often hard pressed to see the underlying significance of events in Green Shiver, meanings that are only revealed at the solution. This extra dimension of mystery in the book adds to its complexity. The imagery of Green Shiver is much more upbeat. Its depiction of Chinese culture concentrates on favorable aspects, while The Man from Tibet often focuses on horror material. Green Shiver is not Pollyanna-ish, but its dark side is in its depiction of the Japanese invasion of China, not its very positive look at Chinese culture itself. Characterization also seems richer in Green Shiver.

Clason is sensitive to color, and his book is a riot of color imagery. Clason is also knowledgeable about botany, and many exotic plants are described. The names in the story also seem to have symbolic meanings. Green Shiver includes such names as Jocasta (wife of Oedipus), Faith, Jasper and Eugene (meaning "well-born", a name given to the spoiled son of a wealthy family). Green Shiver is rich in discussions of Taoism. Westborough is depicted as a follower of Taoism, and the author is clearly sympathetic.

Much of the novel takes place in a large, Chinese style house built by a well to do collector in Los Angeles. Even by the standards of the Golden Age and its interest in architecture, this building is unusual. Oddly, Clason does not make the architecture play a role in the mystery plot. A well done suspense passage (Part Seven) is set against the building and its grounds, however.

This book was published before the US entered World War II, but Clason makes no secret of his pro-Chinese, anti-Axis attitudes here. Clason's Chinese sympathies recall those of Erle Stanley Gardner. Clason, like many others of his day, was outraged by Axis bombing raids. Bombing is treated in this book as a horrific war crime. It makes a telling contrast to today's attitudes in the United States, where bombing is considered the most popular way to wage war.

Mike Grost.