Frames: The Freddie Montgomery Trilogy Books in Order

The "Frames" trilogy stands as one of the most compelling achievements in John Banville’s body of work, serving as a dark, glistening showcase for his signature style. The series is anchored by the character of Freddie Montgomery, a failed scientist and aimless drifter whose life unravels in a way that is both shocking and strangely mesmerising. It is a set of novels that cares very little for the mechanics of police procedure, focusing instead on the terrifying, beautiful, and unreliable landscape of the human mind.

The sequence begins with The Book of Evidence, a novel that introduces us to Freddie as he sits in custody, awaiting trial for a brutal and senseless murder. He isn’t a career criminal or a violent thug in the traditional sense. He is an articulate, highly educated man from a "good family" who returns to Ireland, gets into trouble over money, and ends up killing a housemaid during the theft of a Dutch master painting.

What makes this opening installment so disturbing is not just the violence, but the voice used to describe it.

Freddie narrates his own story with a detached, almost aesthetic chill. He treats the events of his life—and the taking of another life—as if they were abstract problems in geometry or composition. He is charming, witty, and deeply monstrous. Banville forces the reader into the uncomfortable position of admiring the beauty of the prose while being repulsed by the actions it describes. We are trapped inside Freddie’s head, forced to see the world through his haughty, fractured perspective.

The trilogy continues with Ghosts, where the narrative shifts to a remote, wind-swept island. Here, the connections to the first book become dreamlike and oblique. The narrator is unnamed but unmistakably Freddie, now released from prison and living a spectral existence among a small group of castaways. The sharp, violent reality of the first book gives way to a foggy, purgatorial atmosphere where identity feels fluid and the past refuses to stay buried.

In the final installment, Athena, the story returns to the world of art, which has always been Freddie’s obsession and his downfall. He falls into a relationship with a mysterious woman, yet the affair is depicted through a series of parallels to classical paintings. It reinforces the central theme of the entire series: the danger of loving art more than life.

The title "Frames" is a perfect fit for this collection.

It refers to the stolen paintings that drive the plot, but also to the way Freddie "frames" his own narrative to justify the unjustifiable. These novels are profound explorations of guilt, memory, and the lies we tell ourselves to survive. They offer a chilling look at a man who views the world as a canvas, ignoring the human cost of his obsession.