Chris Elliott the actor occasionally lucks his way into scene-stealing roles in movies such as 'Groundhog Day' and 'There's Something about Mary.' Chris Elliott the author, however, has run out of luck, because his fiction debut 'The Shroud of the Thwacker' is an easily forgettable 'Da Vinci Code' parody.
'Thwacker' takes the barest frame of 'The Da Vinci Code''that of a modern day historian using his knowledge to do battle with a secret society intent on evil'and tries funnying it up by instilling loads of stupidity in the protagonists. Elliott then meshes this 'Da Vinci Code' framework with a Jack the Ripper-esque murderer named 'Jack the Jolly Thwacker,' who terrorizes 1882 New York City. The story follows Chief of Police Caleb Spencer, gossip columnist Liz Smith and the drunken mayor of New York, Teddy Roosevelt, as they try to prevent Jack from 'thwacking' again.
Elliott tries playing with the conventions of the genre by casting himself, the washed-up D-list actor, as the modern day historian seeking to solve the Thwacker mystery from the present as a way to 'make a whole lot of money.' This setup does provide some genuine comedy early in the novel, especially when Elliott goes off on tangents about how Yoko Ono desperately wants to take over his apartment so she can expand her studio. Episodes like this show a creative spark in Elliott's writing style, but when he tries applying meaning to these tangents, the story falls apart. By the end, this plotline convolutes everything, and what was once a pleasure to read turns extremely bland and very annoying.
Another area that starts out strong but then comes crashing down about halfway through the story is Elliott's apparent love for intentional anachronisms. The first time one of the characters whips out a kerosene-powered cell phone to receive a call, it is kind of funny. After about 20 cell phone calls, each accompanied by a half page explaining how the oil-powered cell phone works, the humor feels forced and dull.
The sad thing about 'Shroud of the Thwacker' is that it could have told a really funny story with a refreshing take on 'The Da Vinci Code' framework. But Elliott pads it out far too much. He goes on for 350 pages after things stopped making sense a third of the way through the book. Had Elliott written a brief 100 pages without writing himself in the first person, without the many unnecessary plot points and characters and without the lame intentional anachronisms, 'Shroud of the Thwacker' would have made a great read. As it stands, many will forget it on the trash heap along with 'Cabin Boy' and 'Snow Day.'
