![]() ![]() And in The Witch Elm (to be published in the UK as The Wych Elm), it feels as though that sensibility is one step closer. There is a lingering sense it would only take one or two steps for her novels to make the leap fully into horror, embracing the darkness instead of dancing with it at a slight remove. ![]() More than this, all her work is deeply internal, giving in-depth examinations of broken or troubled or damaged people moving through scenarios that are-at least initially-mysterious, treacherous, infinitely unstable. And in Broken Harbour, there are literary found-footage moments to rival even those terrifying scenes in, say, Adam Nevill’s Last Days. The follow-up, The Likeness, takes a bizarre scenario and threads it into a narrative that could be easily be a haunted house story except for the fact there are no ghosts (except, perhaps, those of the mind). Her first novel, In the Woods, utilises a powerful pagan/primal/folk horror sensibility to underscore its psychological detective story. ![]() But a closer look-as anyone who’s read her will know-shows she is more than comfortable incorporating horror into her writing. After all, her work is marketed and sold as crime or thriller books. “Never predictable, never cosy, her books are-in all but name-exercises in quiet, subtle, haunting horror.”Īt first, it might seem a little incongruous reviewing a novel by Tana French on a site dedicated to horror. ![]()
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