The Secret Place

Tana French

Tana French is beloved for her super-readable, dark, psychological crime novels that make up the shared universe of the Dublin Murder Squad series. The settings in and around the Irish capital are rich and atmospheric; the characters feel lived in, embodying the contradictions of real people. All of them — protagonist, antagonist, side characters — are working stuff out. And that character work is explored via complex crimes that are darker than pitch.

Welcome to St. Kilda’s School for girls, a boarding school just outside Dublin, where the students are cliquey and the teachers are clued-out in the way only adults who’ve forgotten their teenage years can be. A year ago, a student from the nearby St. Colm’s school for boys was found murdered on the grounds of St. Kilda’s. His death remains unsolved.

But new evidence has come to light. Holly, a St. Kilda girl and daughter of a cop, has delivered a clue to the police. On the top floor of the school, across the hall from the art room, is a bulletin board: The Secret Place. A safe-space for the girls to post anonymous notes — I think my parents hate me. I hate my parents.

Amidst the usual, mundane notices, Holly has found a photo of the murdered boy with the caption: I know who killed him. That photo kicks off a new round of interrogations at St. Kilda’s that include Holly and her close group of friends, a rival clique, boys from St. Colm’s, and the vaguely uncooperative staff.

Everyone in the splash zone of this murdered boy wants something. Of course they hope the murder will be solved, but their other, baser desires push and pull the action.

Detective Stephen Moran is our point-of-view character. He’s been languishing in the cold case department and believes this is the case that could propel him onto the lauded Dublin Murder Squad. ‘Murder is a shine and a dazzle, a smooth ripple like honed muscle, take your breath away. Murder is a brand on your arm, like an elite army unit’s, like a gladiator’s, saying for all your life: One of us. The finest.’

His working partner is Detective Antoinette Conway, a high achiever at the academy. She was fast-tracked to the murder squad, but a year ago, she couldn’t close this case. As a woman in what’s primarily a man’s world, she everything to prove.

But the truth is elusive at St. Kilda’s. Holly and her three friends are tight, like sisters, like war buddies. They share their deepest hopes and fears with each other — and they hoard secrets like bargaining chips, slowly revealing crucial details when it serves them.

The action takes place during an intense 24 hours. Every conversation — adult to adult, teen to teen, adult to teen, school staff to detective — thrums with undercurrents and unspoken motivations.

Tana French expects her readers to stay sharp, trusting you can navigate through the emotional storms and conflicting accounts. Stephen’s first-person narration makes us privy to his interrogation strategy, his insecurities, his frustrations with the students, and his justified fear of teenage girls. As a counterpoint, dreamy, almost psychedelic third-person flashbacks trace the girls’ lives before and after the murder.

French has a deep understanding of the witchiness of teenage girls, their ability to weave a story that’s not quite a lie, but obscures the truth. At the very moment you think the girls may be monsters, they do or say something so awkward and adolescent, so vulnerable and clueless that you remember: They’re just kids.

It’s also worth mentioning: These girls might be witches. French has morbid fun with elements of the supernatural. The seem to acquire unusual abilities. Mass hysteria sweeps through the school, prompting sightings of ghosts. Even the detectives are rattled by things that flit across their field of vision in the school’s dark hallways.

A sense of unease pervades the whole endeavor, and ultimately, the resolution lies not in supernatural happenings, but in people being people. Messy, craven, lovesick, loving people.

The Court, the biggest and best shopping center within walking distance of Kilda’s and Colm’s, the wrapping of every moment in the world that doesn’t have some sour-faced adult looming over it ready to pounce. The Court pulls like a towering magnet and everyone comes. Anything can happen here, in the sparkling slice of freedom between classes and teatime; your life could lift right off the ground and shimmer into something brand-new. In the dizzying white light all the faces glimmer, they mouth words and crack open in laughs you can almost catch through the cloud of sounds, and any one of them could be the heart-stopping one you’ve been waiting for… — Tana French

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