My cultural highlight of the year has been David Lynch and Mark Frost’s Twin Peaks: The Return. Prior to the 18-hour televisual epic starting, Frost released The Secret History Of Twin Peaks, a neat recap with a few Easter eggs. Now we have a further tie-in volume, reflecting on the events of the series. In part, it allows him to tell stories that were not in the show. Conspicuously absent, for example, was Lara Flynn Boyle’s character from the original, Donna Hayward. In this “novel” – I use the word advisedly as it, like the former tome, is a series of classified reports written by in-show character Tammy Preston – we learn what happened to her. (It follows a particular, recurring arc: not good).
