The Secret Place, Tana French

 I listened to the audiobook while I was packing up the house in preparation to move, and it was perfect for that — so propulsive and absorbing that it took my mind off of the dreary task I was engaged in.

  That said, it's definitely the weakest in the series, I think, and I cared a lot less about this story than I did about the others. French does something new with this book, shifting between two different perspectives, and jumping around in time, and it's interesting, but also somewhat distracting. Curiously, the technique isn't used all that much to show us each character through the other one's eyes, even though such (mis)perceptions are a central focus of the book. 

 

 A major theme in the novel is the idea of deeply close and intimate friendships, and whether or not they can persevere. We watch the powerful bond between a group of teenage girls fray in various ways, even as they fight to keep it together, and this seems to suggest that such closeness is the provenance of youth, helpless against the onslaught of the demands of the adult world. But curiously, the question resurfaces in a different way in the relationship between the two detectives on the case, as they grow increasingly close. Here, French plays with inter-personal perceptions in a different way, especially, in a key moment, by having another character attempt to play the two detectives off of each other, exploiting both of their insecurities. But they will use this same technique against against the teenagers they interrogate. So there's an interesting entanglement here, an exploration of the subtleties of detective work, and in mechanisms of transference, counter-transference, etc. 

 

 There's a really strong focus on socio-economic class, also a major theme in Broken Harbour, the previous book in the series. It's something that seems to come up a lot in contemporary Irish fiction, far more so than in American or British writing, which is interesting to me (I still want to write something about Sally Rooney and marxism...). 

 

Finally, it's a fairly searing take on the social construction of femininity in adolescence. It really cleverly shows how a choice to abstain from (hetero) sex and relationships can give young women a real jolt of power and confidence — the possibility of removing themselves from a fairly toxic social scene (more like a market) that revolves around hook-ups and impossible expectations (the slut/prude problem). But of course, this seems like a great option until you have to deal with...desire. And French reminds us that teenage desire is a hell of a drug, and that there are, after all, some really lovely things about teenage romance. 

 

As with all Tana French novels, there are just so many fascinating threads to unpack. And her prose is absolutely riveting. So though I liked this one the least of all the others in the series, it's still a pretty solid read.