Glass Houses

In Glass Houses, Penny suggests that institutional frameworks often fail to address profound wrongs. The novel suggests that while the law provides order, it does not always provide justice. This pushes several individuals into morally gray choices, guided by what one character calls a “higher court.”

The novel’s critique centers heavily on the cumbersome nature of the law, which derives from the very thing that gives it legitimacy: its norms and rules. The courtroom narrative highlights the conventions and procedures of a criminal trial, while plot points like the climactic gunfight, which spills over into US territory, draw attention to issues of jurisdiction. The many laws governing the application of the law itself serve as a safeguard, but they also mean that the legal system defaults to inaction—a point the novel underscores through its exploration of the opioid crisis. The cartels driving the crisis are flexible in a way the legal system is not. Unbound by bureaucratic norms, they can adapt quickly to changing circumstances while the police and courts are struggling to catch up. This places the law in the position of addressing the crisis on a case-by-case basis while the broader infrastructure of the drug trade remains untouched; the structure of the novel, which juxtaposes the trial with the real-time events of the murder, reinforces that the law is basically reactive in nature. Edouard Valcourt’s death by suicide while under the influence of drugs reveals the moral consequences of this, which both the cobrador and Gamache seek to redress through extra- or illegal means.

The cobrador is the novel’s primary symbol of conscience operating outside the law. This silent, robed figure appears in Three Pines to force a moral reckoning that the legal system cannot. It is a physical manifestation of a “conscience […] called” to address a wrong, and it does so by appealing to personal morality: Its unnerving presence compels the villagers to examine their own pasts, triggering a cascade of confessions about long-held secrets and guilts. Through this collective introspection, Penny establishes that the court of conscience is internal and perpetually in session, unlike the court of law. Similarly, Gamache admits that while he believes in the justice system, what he truly must answer to is his conscience, which he calls a “pretty harsh judge” (1). Gamache ultimately acts on this belief by committing perjury during the trial. As the head of the Sûreté, his decision to lie under oath represents a betrayal of the legal system he is sworn to uphold. Yet, he does so to protect a secret operation designed to dismantle a vast criminal network, sacrificing his career and reputation to pursue a result he believes the law cannot reach on its own and thus underscoring the gap between legal procedure and moral judgment.

Nevertheless, it is significant that Gamache justifies his actions with recourse to legalistic language. The novel is ultimately unwilling to suggest the law has no moral authority, as evidenced by the fact that Gamache is under investigation as the story concludes. The message is instead that while securing justice may sometimes necessitate acting outside the law, such actions must themselves be subject to legal scrutiny so as to avoid a situation in which everyone determines their own “law.”