Dead White Males

Ellen Pilon is a library assistant in the Patrick Power Library at Saint
Mary’s University in Halifax.

Set in Montreal, Dead White Males is filled with street jargon, gay bar
terminology, and pseudo-academic language. The main character, David
Dennings, is a hairdresser turned private detective. (“No Hair Too
Thin, No Case Too Small” is the motto of his Ariadne Hair Design and
Detective Agency.) As he searches for the missing Vera A. Utall
(excerpts from her diary are interspersed throughout the text), he finds
himself attracted to all the men he encounters, whether evil-doers or
cops.

The hard-boiled detective style (“I was sitting at my desk that day,
pondering my bank statement and feeling very much”) is blended with
characters who metamorphose into each other until the reader isn’t
certain who is who. Part mystery and part parody of literary academia,
Dead White Males will bemuse fans of traditional mysteries, but satisfy
those with a taste for unconventional narratives.