- For the defunct avant-garde metal band from Kristiansand, Norway, see In the Woods...
In the Woods is a mystery novel by Tana French. The central theme is the summer evening, (twenty years prior to the novel's events), when twelve year-old Adam and his two best friends failed to come home from a trip into the familiar woods bordering their Ireland estate (estate meaning, in this instance, neighborhood). In the present day, Det. Rob [Adam] Ryan claims that the twin disappearances of his friends and his memory of that afternoon have not had any real effect on his psyche, a statement to which the reader soon finds many objections. Though the novel centers on Ryan and his partner's investigation of the murder of a twelve year-old girl in those same woods, it is the long-ago disappearances which provides the main psychological thrust and thriller elements. For those who have read widely in the mystery genre, the identity of the killer of the young girl, though mysterious in terms of machination and motive, is clear within the first few interactions with the detectives. There are brief feints towards the idea that the disappearances may have involved something of the supernatural, but they are never quite addressed head-on. Those who expect a neat conclusion to every element à la standard mystery formulas will find themselves frustrated. The novel won the 2008 Edgar Award for Best First Novel By An American Author.[1]
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