The Trespasser and The Secret Place

The Trespasser

by Tana French

★★★★☆

No one does a slow burn mystery like Tana French. I love her Dublin murder squad series so much and each time a new book comes out I am beyond excited. She doesn't just write mysteries, she writes beautiful literary fiction that happens to include a mystery. Each of the books in the series is connected but works as a standalone. 

The Trespasser gives us a glimpse into the life of Antoinette Conway, who we met in The Secret Place (book 5). She and her partner, Stephen Moran, are assigned to a murder case at the end of a long shift. They find Aislinn, a lovely young woman, murdered in her home. Rory, a boyfriend, is an obvious suspect, but they have a few other theories to follow. Throughout the investigation Conway has to fight against the prejudice of her own coworkers and her own doubts about herself.

I tried to go slow and savor the story, but I loved every second of it. The atmosphere she creates is palpable and the anxious feeling builds as we get closer to the truth. She writes the best scenes I’ve ever read of detectives interviewing their suspects.

BOTTOM LINE: I’ve yet to be disappointed by French’s work. I liked this one ever more than her last. She gets inside the mind of her characters so completely that it’s easy to forget that she switches her main character in every book!

“No one needs a relationship. What you need is the basic cop-on to figure that out, in the face of all the media bullshit screaming that you're nothing on your own and you're a dangerous freak if you disagree. The truth is, if you don't exist without someone else, you don't exist at all. And that doesn't just go for romance. I love my ma, I love my friends, I love the bones of them. If any of them wanted me to donate a kidney or crack a few heads, I'd do it, no questions asked. And if they all waved goodbye and walked out of my life tomorrow, I'd still be the same person I am today."

The Secret Place

by Tana French

★★★★

The fifth book in the Dublin Murder Squad series focuses on Stephen, who we met in Faithful Place. He's desperate to join the squad. When Holly, the young girl in Faithful Place, now seven years older, gives him a tip about a murder committed in a local prep school, he sees his chance to work with the murder squad. Holly and her three best friends, Julia, Selena, and Rebecca, all become suspects. This novel flashes back and forth between Stephen and Antoinette Conway's investigation in the present and girls' point-of-view during the months leading up to the murder.

BOTTOM LINE: This one felt different from the other books because of its focus on teenage girls and their intense emotions. It wasn't my favorite in the series, but I just love French's writing. She creates tense and enthralling novels each time, even though the characters and plots are never the same.

“That long sigh again, above us. This time I saw it, moving through the branches. Like the trees were listening; like they would've been sad about us, sad for us, only they'd heard it all so many thousand times before.”

“It does that to you, being a detective. You look at blank space and see gears turning, motives and cunning; nothing looks innocent any more. Most times when you prove away the gears, the blank space looks lovely, peaceful. But that arm: innocent, it looked just as dangerous.” 

BOOKS 1-4

In the Woods

The Likeness

Faithful Place

Broken Harbor

R.I.P VIII Wrap Up

This year's R.I.P. Challenge, hosted by Carl at Stainless Steel Droppings, went so well for me! Of the books listed on my original post, I read all but one. Below is the complete list of what I read and links to my reviews. This challenge is so much fun every year. I love reading mysteries, but I rarely devote a whole month to it. 

1) Whose Body? by Dorothy L. Sayers
2) Faithful Place by Tana French
3) The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith
4) The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins (still reading this one)
5) The Secret Keeper by Kate Morton
6) Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn
7) American Gods by Neil Gaiman 
8) Misery by Stephen King 
9) A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore 
10) The Beekeeper's Apprentice by Laurie R. King
11) The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield 
12) M is for Malice by Sue Grafton 

Faithful Place

Faithful Place

by Tana French

★★★★☆

Frank has worked in Undercover in the Dublin police department for years. It’s been more than 20 years since he left his suffocating home in Faithful Place and he’s never looked back. Now, decades after leaving in the middle of the night, he must return home to find out what happened to his childhood sweetheart, Rosie. She was supposed to leave with him that fateful night, but she never showed up.

Frank’s family is the definition of dysfunctional. His overbearing mother, alcoholic father and hostile older brother make for an uncomfortable family reunion. He’s a bit closer to his other siblings, but has only kept in touch with one of them. The story flashes back and forth between the current case and Frank’s life 20 years earlier. Those were my favorite parts of the book; you fall in love with Rosie through Frank’s memories. As he returns to his old neighborhood we can see how broken he truly is. He’s become a shell of a man, driven by his work and not much else.  

BOTTOM LINE: As I’ve found with French’s other books (In the Woods and The Likeness), her writing transcends the plot. This isn’t my favorite in the series but that still sets it far above most books. She paints such vivid pictures of troubled people that you can’t look away until the very last page.

"They might be a spectacularly messed-up bunch and what they felt about me was anyone's guess, but the four of them had dropped whatever they could be doing this evening, put down their lives at a moment's notice and coming here to walk me through this night. We fit together like pieces of a jigsaw, and that felt like a warm gold glow wrapped all around me; like I had stumbled, by some perfect accident, into the right place."

"He held us up to see the lightning flickering above the chimney pots and told us not to be scared of the thunder, because it was just the lightning heating up air as fast as an explosion, and not to be scared of Ma, he was leaning out the window getting shriller by the second. When a sheet of rain finally swept over us he threw his head back to the purple-gray sky and whirl that's round and round in the empty street, Shay and me screaming with laughter like wild things, huge warm drops of rain splattering our faces and electricity crackling in our hair, thunder shaking the ground and rumbling up through Da's bones into ours."

I read this for the R.I.P. Challenge hosted by Stainless Steel Droppings.

R.I.P. Challenge VIII

I look forward to this challenge each fall. I've participated for the last two years and it's such fun. Just pick any book that's a falls into one of the following categories:  Mystery/Suspense/Thriller/Dark Fantasy/Gothic/Horror/Supernatural

Carl at Stainless Steel Droppings is hosting the challenge for the eighth year, so check out his site if you want to join in. There are lots of levels of participation, so check it out!

I'm going to do the following challenge...

Peril the First: Read four books, any length, that you feel fit (my very broad definitions) of R.I.P. literature.  

I'm going to try and read at least 4 of the following books...

1) The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins
2) Faithful Place by Tana French
3) The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith 
4) The Night Watch by Sarah Waters
5) The Secret Keeper by Kate Morton
6) Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn