At the close of 2024, I offer up my favorite read of the year: C.L. Polk's Even Though I Knew the End.
This novella catapulted me through five acts in the span of 133 pages, and it hurt in the best possible way. Settle in for a gritty noir detective story: January 1941, Chicago. The cold bites at your bones. The White City Vampire serial killer stalks the streets among demons and angels. It's been almost ten years since detective and part-time diviner Helen Brandt sold her soul in return for her brother's life, and her time is just about up.
Helen has the chance to win her soul back, but only if she catches the White City Vampire. From the opening scene, Helen captivates with her easy competence and rough exterior. Though she might call herself a "damn greedy fool" from the first sentence, she's also a pragmatist, because of course she is: she's a Capricorn, after all. Her voice is strong and clear as she ticks down her time: "Press on. Cry later. There's work to be done, and not enough time to do it."
Don't fret, we're getting to the sapphic part. Helen's love, Edith, is on the brink of a new career in San Francisco, just like they've always dreamed of. Here, the gift of the novel is laid bare-its bittersweet heartache, pulsing throughout. It rips at you and gives you beautifully poetic passages on impossible sapphic domestic bliss:
"'We could get a house.' I fought to make my smile something she would understand. 'Our house on a hill.' It was a lie, but it was a wish, too. A house in the city where people like us carved out home for themselves, a city that didn't mind us much. She was ready for everything we'd talked about in the dark... ...We danced through the dream. Our house, steep-roofed and narrow, holding its balance against the slanted street. Our cars tucked side by side, every night asleep in our bed, every morning coffee and orange juice and my turn to burn the sausage."
Brimming with spare and evocative prose, Even Though I Knew the End makes every word count. The novella's scenes are lit with a kind of stark clarity I can only dream of achieving one day. As a single-minded reader, it's tough to drag me out of the flow, but there were moments I couldn't help but pause and marvel at the deft construction of a phrase. I was particularly delighted by the "genteel hatred seething from the women fighting for matching sheets and towels" during the Marshall Field's white sale. Polk also anchors the narrative with reminders of the time period: a newspaper headline here, an unfortunate prejudice there.
Filled with thrumming urgency, unexpected developments, and a surprisingly inoffensive religiosity (my take only-tread lightly), Even Though I Knew the End is a supernatural romp that packs one hell of an emotional gut punch. There's a reason why it has garnered so many accolades, and a big part of that is how it haunts you long after it's gone. Something from the novella still echoes in me, and I can't help but reply.
I would have done it, too.Content warnings: religiosity, homophobia, mental illness, asylum
Susanne Salehi (she/they) is a queer Iranian writer residing in the American South with their partner and two cats. She's a Taurus, sticker collector, and puzzle fiend that's happiest when reading, cross stitching, gardening, or acquiring silly tattoos. They are also a part time MFA student at Emerson College, busy writing the epic sapphic heroes they've always wanted to see. More @susannesalehi or susannesalehi.com.
