Pandora's Box

by Alice Thompson

One dark night, Dr. Noah Close, a plastic surgeon, opens the door to find a beautiful woman aflame on his doorstep. She is without name or voice or past. Noah puts out the fire, nurses her to health, and makes her his wife. He calls her Pandora, and for a while, they live together contentedly. A year later Noah wakes in the middle of the night to find Pandora beside him in bed covered with blood. He goes to call for an ambulance, but when he returns, she has vanished. Her inexplicable disappearance catapults Noah out of his clinical, ordered existence into a life on the run and a stop-at-nothing search for answers. Pandora's uncertain past leaves Noah with little to go on. He begins his unorthodox investigation by honing the art of breaking and entering and then enlists the help of Venus—a private investigator with mystical visions and a strange habit of changing sexes. The pursuit takes the pair to the lush depravity of Las Vegas, where they meet Lazarus, a sculptor obsessed with the human form, who curiously mirrors the features and expressions of others on his own face. Seductive and chilling, Pandora's Box is an imaginative take on the myth of Pandora and the concept of beauty.

Genres: Fiction, Horror, Mystery

148 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Alice Thompson is a Scottish novelist.

Thompson was educated at St George's School, Edinburgh, then read English at Oxford and wrote her Ph.D. thesis on Henry James. In the 1980s she played keyboard with rock band The Woodentops.

She has a son and lives in Edinburgh. Her novel Justine was the joint winner of the 1996 James Tait Black Memorial Prize. She has also won a Creative Scotland Award in 2000 and was a Writer in Residence in Shetland.

Reviews

[Cherie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Looked at from a literal sense, Pandora's Box seems like some kind of wild mushroom trip. However, when perceived from the allegorical sense from which it was intended, we see the myth of Pandora molded into a chilling and spooky tale, quite appropriate for the season too. ;)

One dark and stormy night—LOL don't you just love it when stories start that way?—Dr. Noah Close opens his door to find a beautiful woman standing within a circle of fire on his doorstop. As he discovers, though surrounded by fire, her skin is actually quite cool to the touch. She is without voice or any discernible history, but Noah takes her in, nurses her back to health, and performs the necessary surgery to regraft her skin, for even much of her facial structure was lost to the fire. He names her Pandora and she becomes his wife. Though mute, they communicate through actions alone, and Noah finally believes he has found true happiness and bliss.

But a year later things start to fall apart. Strange, mysterious letters begin to arrive in the mail for Pandora, each saying the same thing, a single sentence: Do not be afraid of what you want. So begins the downward spiral....

One night, several weeks after the letters stop—just as mysteriously as they'd started—Noah wakes to find Pandora's bloody corpse lying next to him in bed, her breasts cut off, blood running over and between her legs and all over the sheets. Noah leaps from bed to call for emergency services but upon returning to his bedroom with the police, he finds the corpse gone!

So begins Noah's search for answers. Leaving his ordered existence behind, he begins his life on the run, abducting a strangely odd private investigator with a penchant for mystic visions to aid him in his search. Pandora's uncertain past doesn't leave much to go on, beyond the odd murmurings of the psychic Venus, but their trip leads them from the city to the lush depravity of the desert and Las Vegas, where they meet an even stranger man named Lazarus: a sculptor who is able to mirror the features and expressions of others on his own face. And Noah is certain that Lazurus holds the key to Pandora's mysterious disappearance.

Though fairly short, this haunting story will will stay with you long after you've put it down. But I do recommend taking the time to understand the deeper meaning behind it. Yeah, it's pretty freaky at face value, but even more so when you relate the whole thing to the mythical Pandora of legend. :)

[Callum McLaughlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A strange and intriguing tale about a mute woman who appears on a doctor's doorstep, ravaged by flames. He takes her charred body and literally re-creates her bit by bit using skin grafts, names her Pandora and makes her his wife. But it seems this may not be the life she wants to live.

Playing a lot with mythology and gender, this obscure story is certainly open to interpretation, but to me it speaks of being true to ourselves and about not holding others back from being their own authentic self, whether we are speaking specifically about making our approach towards gender a more fluid thing, or just in general.

[Terra · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pandora's Box by Alice Thompson is story so similar to Rod Sterling's Twilight Zone stories that I can actually see it in television form. It's quite strange to say the least but keeps you reading because of it weird ling way.

Dr. Noah Close is a surgeon that tends to burn victims and reconstructive patients. He's very set in his ways and the best at what he does so when a woman in flames stumbles upon his doorstep he is thrown into action to get her to the hospital. Once there he just dumps her off and then heads for home without inquiring as to how she is. Just a little queer don't you think!

The story actually starts out with Zeus creating a few Gods and Goddesses while explaining why and what their mission is. The last he creates in this tale is Medusa and the clip then explains why and what he plans to do with her. Strange!! This is just the backdrop for the rest of the story but will lead you from the beginning to the end of the story wondering what's this got to do with Noah.

Now that I have finished this story I have to say that it was the strangest book I have ever read. I still don't quite get the jest of it and don't really know if I want to. It was slow in spots and tedious but you keep on going because you want to find out who the killer is and why he did it. All I can say is thank goodness it was a short read.

[A. J · Rating 3 out of 5]

Alice Thompson's story Pandora's Box is of course a retelling of the original myth, but the story of Pandora takes on a whole new twist in this mystery-esque meets poetical thriller.

While the plot can be hard to follow at times, the prose is absolutely beautiful. Alice Thompson always writes in such a lyrical way that one can't help liking her books just for that.
If you're looking for a book with an easy to follow story, and normal character development this isn't your book. This is a book that you read and then read in between the lines. It's a story where you have to step back from and look behind what's currently going on in page. But this is a beautiful book. It's a short read, my copy was 148 pages. It's a story that inspires other stories, and then more stories after that.

After reading Pandora's Box, and another of Thompson's books, I honestly think every writer should read at least one of her stories. All of her books are very well structured, and I find her books are good examples to learn from.

I gave this book 3 stars on Goodreads.

[JoAnne · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a strange story. Dr. Noah Close finds a burned woman on his doorstep. He is a plastic surgeon. He fixes her up and then finds her in his house. Weird! Noah names her Pandora after he finds a strange glass box in a closet. He falls in love and considers her his wife. Then she starts getting these strange notes. It changes her. Then he wakes up one night. He sees her bloody and dead. He goes to call the police but when they come there is no body. Noah is a suspect. Then he goes on some weird journey to find the killer.
I don't care for books that let you determine what everything means.

[Pam · Rating 4 out of 5]

While I tend to read more realistic fictional stories, I did think this was decent for a mystical reading experience. Definitely not amazing, but still worth the short read. The plot moves along fairly well. It has an attention getting start, seemed a bit contrived and started to lose my interest at times in the middle, but quickly picks back up when the reader is introduced to Lazarus. I think a little more depth of character would have improved the story considerably, but overall I'd give it 3.5 stars. It's better than mediocre. =)

[Christine Boris · Rating 2 out of 5]

this book has been on my shelf for awhile and I picked it off as I wanted a quick read. (Not much over 100 pages). I was intrigued through the first 30 pages or so and then...I just didn't like it. I kept skim-reading it as it was odd and I hoped for some decipherable payoff, but there was none. I've got to start making note as to what makes me put a book on my " to read" list, as this one was a mystery. ( no pun intended)