◆ “The Searcher” by Tana French.

By Wendi Walton
Branch Manager,
Alpine Branch Library

Tana French is one of my favorite authors, and her work has been awarded the Edgar, Anthony, and Barry Awards, the L.A. Times Award for best Mystery/Thriller, and the Irish Book Award for Crime Fiction.

But, if I’m being honest, I haven’t loved a couple of her more recent mysteries.

However, French’s newest book, “The Searcher,” reminded me of why I usually gobble up her stories! With a plot that is more of a simmer than a boil, with characters and a sense of place that are richly drawn, this stand alone literary mystery kept me turning the pages. “The Searcher” is not part of the author’s popular Dublin Murder Squad series (recently made into a Netflix series). Rather, it features rural Ireland as the setting and an outsider detective from the U.S.A.

As the reader, we see things through the eyes of the main character, Cal Hooper, a retired Chicago cop, who buys a fixer upper farmhouse, on somewhat of a whim, in an Irish village, hoping to find some peace and quiet.

The story revolves around Cal, and one of his young neighbors, whose brother has gone missing.

Of course, Cal doesn’t necessarily find the respite from his troubles that he had been hoping for. He does, however, find himself involved in the lives of the villagers and farm folk. Cal must wade through the secrets of the small town’s history to work out the intricacies of who is hiding something sinister and dark.

I also got a feeling for the landscape, location and small town lifestyle thanks to French’s unique descriptions. Here she writes about Cal fishing in a nearby river, “It’s narrow enough that the massive old trees touch across it, rocky enough to make the water swirl and whiten; the banks are speckled orange-gold with fallen leaves…Birds flip and sass each other between branches, paying no attention to him, and the smell of the water is so strong and sweet he can feel it against his skin.”

And I found that French’s description of driving created a vivid picture in my head, “For the first time since he arrived, Ireland feels tiny and cramped to him. What he needs is thousands of miles of open highway where he can floor it all day and all night long…If he tried that around here, he would get about fifty yards before running into an unjustifiable road twist, a flock of sheep, a pothole the size of his bathtub or a tractor going the other way.”

So, as Cal is trying to adjust to his new home, he is starting to wonder if he has picked the right place to retire…Are the locals at the pub being friendly or just trying to keep an eye on his investigation? Is his young neighbor telling him the truth, or leading him into something he should stay away from?
“The Searcher” by Tana French is available as an e-book, e-audiobook, hardback book and CD audio throughout the Lincoln County Library System!