Girl in Snow by Danya Kukafka

Simon & Schuster, 384 pages, $16

Most of the action in “Girl in Snow,” the first novel by author Danya Kukafka, takes place in 2005, in a little town in Colorado. It is February, so the snow in “Girl in Snow” is a foregone conclusion. The girl is fifteen-year-old Lucinda Hayes. She was pretty. Of course she was.

Kukafka presents several viewpoints and tenses, a tough literary juggle. We hear from another teenage girl, Jade, a former friend. We hear from Cameron, a teenage boy who is Lucinda’s … shadow. He might be creepy enough to be a stalker. We hear from Russ, Cameron’s father’s former police patrolman buddy: so, a grown-up. Sometimes we hear from Jade in the first person and sometimes in the urgent second person singular.

The focus is, of course, on Lucinda, but not as much as you would think. Jade, Cameron, Russ are all outsiders. None of them could be called good-looking. Kukafka details the physical blemishes of her main and subsidiary characters. The teenage years are spotty at best for most. These outsiders look in at themselves and the investigation. They are witnesses and vessels of misery. And they are suspects.

Cameron is haunted by the disgrace and subsequent disappearance of his father. He is silent and “tangled,” as he would say. He has difficulty in social situations. He is obsessed with Lucinda. On “Statue Nights,” he stands in Lucinda’s backyard and watches her through her window. Late at night, on his rambles, he waves to Ivan, the janitor at his high school.

Ivan is the brother-in-law of Russ. Russ has almost accidentally married Ines, Ivan’s sister. After Ivan was released from prison, Russ helped him get the school job. He, too, is a suspect.

Who is not a suspect? The high school art teacher and object of much teenage affection is one. The parents, who are rarely seen, are suspects. How about Cameron’s mother? How about Jade’s abusive mother? How about Lucinda’s boyfriend? Maybe Lucinda’s boyfriend is Zap, whose real name is Edourd Arnaud. Jade used to be friends with Zap, too.

Part of the task Kukafka sets herself is showing the relationships between the many characters. When the big murder reveal arrives, it lands more with a by-the-way than an aha. In the process of hearing the main characters’ stories, Lucinda isn’t really illuminated so much as designated the object of catharsis. Being an outsider means there’s a lot more of interest to lay bare than for a “normal” person. Lucinda was a teenage darling, popular with boys, girls, parents. In other words, not an outsider. 

This book is a psychological page-turner, with main characters whose curious stories are compelling.