In the Woods
Encyclopedia
In the Woods is a 2007 mystery
novel by Tana French
about a pair of Irish detectives and their investigation of the murder of a twelve year old girl. The novel won several awards such as the 2008 Edgar Award
for Best First Novel By An American Author, the 2008 Barry Award
for Best First Novel, the 2008 Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel, and the 2008 Anthony Award
for Best First Novel.
. A search is called by the families, and the police find Adam shivering, clawing the bark of a nearby tree, blood on his shoes and slash marks on his back. He is unable to tell them what happened or where his friends are. His amnesia holds to the present day, where he goes by his middle name, Rob, to avoid the attention of the media to his famous case. His friends were never found.
The plot of the novel circles around the murder of a twelve year old girl, Katy Devlin, whose case Rob and his partner Cassie Maddox are given to investigate. The body is found in the same woods where Rob’s friends disappeared, at a dig site, and the coincidence is enough to make Rob nervous, though he insists to his partner that he is fine.
Cassie and Rob have been partners for a few years and get along famously, teasing one another and completing one another’s thoughts. There are many rumors at the station that they are romantically involved, though both of them scoff at the idea, despite the fact that they live almost like a married couple, spending a lot of time at Cassie’s cooking dinner for one another, drinking wine, and having Rob crash on Cassie’s couch across the room.
Katy’s murder takes the pair along many lines of investigation. Her death might be related to her father’s protestation of the new highway meant to go straight through the dig site, or one of the students on the dig might have attacked her. She might have been abused by her father or someone else (her mother, twin sister, or older sister) in the family. She might have been previously poisoned over time. Or it might be related to the disappearance of Rob’s friends, as a clip that one of his friends was wearing that day appeared near the crime scene.
These possibilities are investigated, but the detectives come up frustratingly empty-handed at every turn. The case messes with Rob’s psyche as he tries to remember details about the two previous disappearances in case it would help. He tries spending the night in the woods, but freaks out and calls Cassie to pick him up. He’s afraid to sleep again, thinking that he’ll just have nightmares, so Cassie allows him into her bed. Things escalate from there and they end up sleeping together.
Rob feels immensely awkward after and can’t go back to their normal jokey-insult ways, but also feels that he can’t start a relationship with her. Their partnership deteriorates just as they start to uncover new leads in the case and they are unable to discuss the case and get along the way they used to.
Rob goes back to the dig site alone, where all the students are frantically digging before the site is shut down for the construction of the highway. He comes to a realization and calls in the forensics team again, who discover the location of the murder in a shed to which only three people have the key. After some heavy interrogation, one of the suspects confesses, though his motive is far from clear.
It becomes clearer when the suspect contends that he had been dating Katy’s older sister, Rosalind. When questioned by Cassie, she denies it and any involvement in Katy’s death, but also makes a comment about Cassie is obviously sleeping with Rob. Cassie takes it in stride, but after the interrogation, she has an idea of how to get a confession out of Rosalind: Go to her and admit sleeping with Rob and promise to keep her updated on the case if she promises not to tell.
Rosalind’s psychopathic tendencies get the better of her, and once she knows that she has Cassie in her debt, she brags about the whole thing and how she got the murderer to come up with the idea by telling him all three girls were being sexually abused by their father, but that Katy liked it and was therefore their father’s favorite. Rosalind also told him that Katy told their father lies to make him beat them and would watch and laugh, that if Katy was gone, then they would be happy. She also admitted to Cassie that Katy was strong-willed and wouldn’t always do as Rosalind told her, so she had poisoned her to make her sick. After this confession, recorded on a wire, Cassie arrests her and takes her in, but because Rosalind was a few months from turning 18 (though she had told Rob previously that she was already 18), the confession is invalid. She is released with a smug smile.
The Police Captain has learned that Rob is actually Adam Ryan and confines him to desk work. He never goes back to Detective work. Cassie starts dating someone else and gets engaged. Rob is heartbroken and calls her, but it’s too late. He goes to the dig site to see the highway construction has begun, and thinks that he’ll never regain his lost memories of that night.
gave Into the Woods a starred review and hailed it as “…a superior novel about cops, murder, memory, relationships, and modern Ireland. The characters of Ryan and Maddox, as well as a handful of others, are vividly developed… Equally striking is the picture of contemporary Ireland, booming economically and fixated on the shabbiest aspects of American popular culture. An outstanding debut and a series to watch for procedural fans.” Publishers Weekly
praised author French, saying she “… expertly walks the line between police procedural and psychological thriller in her debut” and that “Ryan and Maddox are empathetic and flawed heroes, whose partnership and friendship elevate the narrative beyond a gory tale of murdered children and repressed childhood trauma.” Kirkus Reviews
said of the novel, “When not lengthily bogged down in angst, a readable, non-formulaic police procedural with a twist. It’s ultimately the confession of a damaged man.”
Mystery fiction
Mystery fiction is a loosely-defined term.1.It is often used as a synonym for detective fiction or crime fiction— in other words a novel or short story in which a detective investigates and solves a crime mystery. Sometimes mystery books are nonfiction...
novel by Tana French
Tana French
Tana French is an Irish novelist and theatrical actress. Her debut novel In the Woods , a psychological mystery, won the Edgar, Anthony, Macavity, and Barry awards for best first novel...
about a pair of Irish detectives and their investigation of the murder of a twelve year old girl. The novel won several awards such as the 2008 Edgar Award
Edgar Award
The Edgar Allan Poe Awards , named after Edgar Allan Poe, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America...
for Best First Novel By An American Author, the 2008 Barry Award
Barry Award (for crime novels)
The Barry Award is a crime literary prize awarded annually since 1997 by the editors of Deadly Pleasures, an American quarterly publication for crime fiction readers. From 2007-2009 the award was jointly presented with the publication Mystery News...
for Best First Novel, the 2008 Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel, and the 2008 Anthony Award
Anthony Award
The Anthony Awards are literary awards for mystery writers presented at the Bouchercon World Mystery Convention since 1986. The awards are named for Anthony Boucher , one of the founders of the Mystery Writers of America....
for Best First Novel.
Plot
Twenty years prior to the novel's events, twelve year-old Adam and his two best friends failed to come home after playing in the familiar woods bordering their Irish housing estateHousing estate
A housing estate is a group of buildings built together as a single development. The exact form may vary from country to country. Accordingly, a housing estate is usually built by a single contractor, with only a few styles of house or building design, so they tend to be uniform in appearance...
. A search is called by the families, and the police find Adam shivering, clawing the bark of a nearby tree, blood on his shoes and slash marks on his back. He is unable to tell them what happened or where his friends are. His amnesia holds to the present day, where he goes by his middle name, Rob, to avoid the attention of the media to his famous case. His friends were never found.
The plot of the novel circles around the murder of a twelve year old girl, Katy Devlin, whose case Rob and his partner Cassie Maddox are given to investigate. The body is found in the same woods where Rob’s friends disappeared, at a dig site, and the coincidence is enough to make Rob nervous, though he insists to his partner that he is fine.
Cassie and Rob have been partners for a few years and get along famously, teasing one another and completing one another’s thoughts. There are many rumors at the station that they are romantically involved, though both of them scoff at the idea, despite the fact that they live almost like a married couple, spending a lot of time at Cassie’s cooking dinner for one another, drinking wine, and having Rob crash on Cassie’s couch across the room.
Katy’s murder takes the pair along many lines of investigation. Her death might be related to her father’s protestation of the new highway meant to go straight through the dig site, or one of the students on the dig might have attacked her. She might have been abused by her father or someone else (her mother, twin sister, or older sister) in the family. She might have been previously poisoned over time. Or it might be related to the disappearance of Rob’s friends, as a clip that one of his friends was wearing that day appeared near the crime scene.
These possibilities are investigated, but the detectives come up frustratingly empty-handed at every turn. The case messes with Rob’s psyche as he tries to remember details about the two previous disappearances in case it would help. He tries spending the night in the woods, but freaks out and calls Cassie to pick him up. He’s afraid to sleep again, thinking that he’ll just have nightmares, so Cassie allows him into her bed. Things escalate from there and they end up sleeping together.
Rob feels immensely awkward after and can’t go back to their normal jokey-insult ways, but also feels that he can’t start a relationship with her. Their partnership deteriorates just as they start to uncover new leads in the case and they are unable to discuss the case and get along the way they used to.
Rob goes back to the dig site alone, where all the students are frantically digging before the site is shut down for the construction of the highway. He comes to a realization and calls in the forensics team again, who discover the location of the murder in a shed to which only three people have the key. After some heavy interrogation, one of the suspects confesses, though his motive is far from clear.
It becomes clearer when the suspect contends that he had been dating Katy’s older sister, Rosalind. When questioned by Cassie, she denies it and any involvement in Katy’s death, but also makes a comment about Cassie is obviously sleeping with Rob. Cassie takes it in stride, but after the interrogation, she has an idea of how to get a confession out of Rosalind: Go to her and admit sleeping with Rob and promise to keep her updated on the case if she promises not to tell.
Rosalind’s psychopathic tendencies get the better of her, and once she knows that she has Cassie in her debt, she brags about the whole thing and how she got the murderer to come up with the idea by telling him all three girls were being sexually abused by their father, but that Katy liked it and was therefore their father’s favorite. Rosalind also told him that Katy told their father lies to make him beat them and would watch and laugh, that if Katy was gone, then they would be happy. She also admitted to Cassie that Katy was strong-willed and wouldn’t always do as Rosalind told her, so she had poisoned her to make her sick. After this confession, recorded on a wire, Cassie arrests her and takes her in, but because Rosalind was a few months from turning 18 (though she had told Rob previously that she was already 18), the confession is invalid. She is released with a smug smile.
The Police Captain has learned that Rob is actually Adam Ryan and confines him to desk work. He never goes back to Detective work. Cassie starts dating someone else and gets engaged. Rob is heartbroken and calls her, but it’s too late. He goes to the dig site to see the highway construction has begun, and thinks that he’ll never regain his lost memories of that night.
Reception
Thomas Gaughan of BooklistBooklist
Booklist is a publication of the American Library Association that provides critical reviews of books and audiovisual materials for all ages. It is geared toward libraries and booksellers and is available in print or online...
gave Into the Woods a starred review and hailed it as “…a superior novel about cops, murder, memory, relationships, and modern Ireland. The characters of Ryan and Maddox, as well as a handful of others, are vividly developed… Equally striking is the picture of contemporary Ireland, booming economically and fixated on the shabbiest aspects of American popular culture. An outstanding debut and a series to watch for procedural fans.” Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly
Publishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...
praised author French, saying she “… expertly walks the line between police procedural and psychological thriller in her debut” and that “Ryan and Maddox are empathetic and flawed heroes, whose partnership and friendship elevate the narrative beyond a gory tale of murdered children and repressed childhood trauma.” Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus Reviews
Kirkus Reviews is an American book review magazine founded in 1933 by Virginia Kirkus . Kirkus serves the book and literary trade sector, including libraries, publishers, literary and film agents, film and TV producers and booksellers. Kirkus Reviews is published on the first and 15th of each month...
said of the novel, “When not lengthily bogged down in angst, a readable, non-formulaic police procedural with a twist. It’s ultimately the confession of a damaged man.”
Awards and nominations
- Edgar AwardEdgar AwardThe Edgar Allan Poe Awards , named after Edgar Allan Poe, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America...
for Best First Novel By An American Author, 2008 - Barry AwardBarry Award (for crime novels)The Barry Award is a crime literary prize awarded annually since 1997 by the editors of Deadly Pleasures, an American quarterly publication for crime fiction readers. From 2007-2009 the award was jointly presented with the publication Mystery News...
for Best First Novel, 2008 - Macavity Award for Best First Mystery Novel, 2008
- Anthony AwardAnthony AwardThe Anthony Awards are literary awards for mystery writers presented at the Bouchercon World Mystery Convention since 1986. The awards are named for Anthony Boucher , one of the founders of the Mystery Writers of America....
for Best First Novel, 2008