What if movie characters and storylines were actually all interconnected?
That's the basic premise of Suspects, a slim book that isn't really a novel as much as a collection of short retellings and embellishments of several dozen film noir (and film noirish) classics from the 30's up to around 1980. But there is an overarching story here that only becomes apparent near the end - the family tree at the beginning is a bit of a teaser. There's a narrator for all this, and who it is eventually (and surprisingly) becomes clear.
Thomson is a film reviewer, and he knows his stuff. The films he includes were almost all full of innuendo, which Thomsen is able to utilize and fill in the blanks, and go beyond them. its a book where Mary Ann Simpson and Noah Cross have a past, and we find out who Travis Bickle's parents to whom he was always writing, were.
This is an interesting concept for a book in that audiences tend to identify quite closely with film characters. By focusing on the more shady characters, who often seem to reinvent themselves (and Thomson gives them even more opportunities to do so here), he breaks down the barriers among characters, the actors who play them, and the audience even more.
