In the Woods by Tana French *****

In the Woods (#1/6 Dublin Murder Squad) by Tana French features two crimes involving children. Twenty years ago twelve-year-old Adam Robert Ryan’s two best friends disappeared. Now twelve-year-old Katherine Devlin was discovered murdered in the same area and Rob Ryan with partner Cassie Maddox are assigned to investigate. If you demand justice for these innocent children, this is not the book for you.

Tana French is an accomplished writer with interesting characters and richly detailed settings. Her plots twist and turn. She all sneaks in obscure (to me) literary references.  For example when Ryan says, “Don’t let me fool you into seeing us as a bunch of parfit gentil knights galloping off in doublets after Lady Truth on her white palfrey,” this is a quote from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.

This is a gritty story. In addition to all the discussion of child abuse, there are corrupt politicians and a teenage boy who gang rapes his girlfriend.

My new favorite series with engaging characters and complex plots (set in Dublin).

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Faithful Place by Tana French *****

Faithful Place (#3/6 Dublin Murder Squad) byTana French begins when Frank Mackey is summoned home after 22 years. On the night he left, he’d planned to elope with Rosie Daly, but she hadn’t shown up for their rendezvous. Now new evidence suggests that she hadn’t abandoned him as he feared. With his return, he is forced to face his dysfunctional family, along with a reevaluation of his relationship with his ex-wife Olivia and their nine-year-old daughter Holly.

In addition to Frank’s relationship with his ex-wife and child, the book explores the complex interactions among the families stuck in poverty, how they support and compete with each other. Faithful Place is a block of semi-detached houses where the generations live together dependent on each other and each looking for a way out.

The writing is beautiful on a paragraph-by-paragraph level and how the entirety is put together.

The book uses a lot of Dublin (Irish) slang: nixer (informal extra job usually paid in cash), mot (girlfriend), slapper (derogatory for a woman), skanger (derogatory for a young working-class person), slagging (making fun of), wagon (wild girl), and yoke (thingamajig), for a few examples.

My new favorite series for engaging characters set in Dublin.

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The Searcher by Tana French ***

In the standalone novel, The Searcher by Irish writer Tana French, Calvin John Hooper (Cal) has retired from the Chicago PD to rural Ireland to find peace and quiet in Ardnakelty. He has purchased a run-down house with plans to fix it up. Instead, he met Trey Reddy, a thirteen-year-old, whose older brother had disappeared. Together they investigated the disappearance. The result was too cynical for my taste.

The many characters who people Ardnakelty and the small-town dynamics are the highlights of this novel. The small-town acceptance of the status quo which includes hopelessness and gratuitous violence was a bit depressing for my taste.

The writing is excellent.

A mystery set in a world with no justice. Other reviewers recommend her Dublin Murder Squad series instead.

For my expanded notes: https://1book42day.blogspot.com/2020/03/normal-people-by-sally-rooney.html

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