Broken Harbor
When Detective Scorcher Kennedy is assigned a top-priority murder case in the Dublin suburb of Brianstown, the crime's location dredges up haunting childhood memories. Once called Broken Harbor, Brianstown is now a half-developed luxury estate where cookie-cutter houses line mostly empty neighborhoods overlooking a stormy coast.
Yet even as Broken Harbor pulls at Kennedy's past, he must put that aside to focus on the tragic case in front of him: the brutal attack on the Spain family. Two small children and their father are dead, and the mother is in critical condition after multiple stab wounds. An early lead sends Kennedy and his rookie partner Detective Curran down an ominous path, but dark surprises lurk in every corner of Broken Harbor's overgrown streets.
The fourth installment in the Dublin Murder Squad series, Broken Harbor follows In the Woods, The Likeness, and Faithful Place, and precedes The Secret Place and The Trespasser.
Quote:
"The ghosts I believe in weren't trapped in the Spains' bloodstains. They thronged the whole estate, whirling like great moths in and out of the empty doorways and over the expanses of cracked earth, battering against the sparse lighted windows, mouths stretched wide in silent howls: all the people who should have lived here. The young men who had dreamed of carrying their wives of these thresholds, the babies who should have been brought home from the hospital to soft nurseries in these rooms, the teenagers who should have had their first kisses leaning against lampposts that would never be lit. Over time, the ghosts of things that happened start to turn distant; once they've cut you a couple million times, their edges blunt on your scar tissue, they wear thin. The ones that slice like razors forever are the ghosts of things that never got the chance to happen."
Author:
Tana French has lived in Ireland, Italy, Malawi, and the United States. Her first novel, In the Woods, won the Edgar Award in 2007 and was followed by several sequels as part of the Dublin Murder Squad series. In addition to writing, French has worked as a stage, film and voice-over actress.
Published: 2012
Length: 450 pages
Set in: Dublin, Ireland