BOOKS: In the Woods, Tana French (2007)

This year's winner of the Edgar Award for Best First Novel.

Twenty years ago, three children disappeared in the woods near their homes on the outskirts of Dublin. After several hours of searching, Adam Robert Ryan was found; he was essentially unharmed, though his shoes and socks were filled with blood, and he was clinging so tightly to a tree that he had to be pried loose. He didn't speak a word for two weeks, and never remembered any of what had happened to him that day; the other two children were never found.

Today, Rob Ryan is a member of the murder squad on the Dublin police force. His partner, Cassie, is the only one of his colleagues who knows about that childhood experience, which is why no one objects when Rob is assigned to the case of a new child murder in those same woods.

This is a very fine book. The characters and relationships are fully drawn, the suspense of the police work is terrifically exciting, and the writing is lovely to read. Take, for instance, these paragraphs from early in the book:

What I warn you to remember is that I am a detective. Our relationship with truth is fundamental but cracked, refracting confusingly like fragmented glass. It is the core of our careers, the endgame of every move we make, and we pursue it with strategies painstakingly constructed of lies and concealment and every variation on deception. The truth is the most desirable woman in the world and we are the most jealous lovers, reflexively denying anyone else the slightest glimpse of her. We betray her routinely, spending hours and days stupor-deep in lies, and then turn back to her holding out the lover's ultimate Möbius strip: But I only did it because I love you so much.

This is my job, and you don't go into it -- or if you do, you don't last -- without some natural affinity for its priorities and demands. What I am telling you, before I begin my story, is this -- two things: I crave truth. And I lie.

Best of all, the relationships among the characters actually effect the way they do their jobs. There is a magnificent scene late in the book which finds Cassie interrogating the principal suspect while Rob and their boss listen in; the complexities of what Cassie is saying to the suspect, what she's really saying to Rob, and what she's not saying to their boss are intricate and beautifully played out.
This is not just an excellent police thriller; it's an excellent novel, even for people who think they don't like police thrillers. Recommended without reservation.