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Tana French and Revisiting Broken Harbor


I first heard about Tana French back in 2014, and started with In the Woods, the first in her Dublin Murder Squad series. I was quickly hooked, as is to be expected when you're dealing with a writer as talented with atmospheric world building and complex, nuanced characters. As I'm wont to do, I rushed into her other books, Faithful Place, Broken Harbor, and eventually The Likeness. The Secret Place I didn't have until January 2015, and then after that it was The Trespasser, and finally The Witch Elm as they came out. 

In my early rush to consume everything she'd written, I found myself a little disappointed with Broken Harbor— the 4th in the Dublin Murder Squad series. Admittedly, having read it so long ago, and so quickly, there's a lot of the story that I no longer even remember. 

Our main crime happens in a small real estate development a ways outside of Dublin, which has been hit hard by the recession of 2008. It's half built and abandoned, except for those poor suckers who bought homes early on under the promise that Oceanview (FKA Broken Harbor) would soon be a bustling place to raise a family. Three people, two of them children, are dead, and one is in very bad shape in the hospital. 

The detectives assigned to the case are one of the top solvers, Mick "Scorcher" Kennedy, and new kid in the department, Richie Curran. 

What I love about Tana French is how she can absolutely vacuum your attention into a story to the point where you feel like you're hovering over the characters watching them in action. You can see the atmosphere, you can hear their voices. The reflective internal narrative of her protagonists makes you feel like you are hearing their thoughts as your own, as well. 

This story broke my heart some, and not just because of the horrific crime involving young children. It leaves a feeling of sadness behind, but my god, what a satisfying reading experience. A measurement of whether a book has been well-written or not is whether afterwards I feel alone and like I've lost a friend or confidante suddenly once it's finished. I felt that here, and then some. 

Rereading this has given me some interesting insight into my own reading habits. Admittedly, even though I only read this back in 2014, I had no idea who the killer was when I started rereading. Finding out was a surprise once again, and while some characters felt familiar, I felt like I was suddenly seeing them with glasses on for the first time. I found myself relating more to Kennedy than I would ever have back in 2014, and I think time and self-knowledge has been the cause of that. The question now is whether to go back and crack open Faithful Place, The Likeness, and The Secret Place once again. Perhaps I'll meet new versions of each of those characters on rereading again, too. 

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