Broken Harbour by Tana French

[donotsquandertime]

Just finished this book and I loved it but am left confused by a part of it- might be me missing the explanation but has anyone read it that can answer a question please, obviously if you have not read this and intend to do not read further as it will spoil the book for you.

I've read it and loved it - what's the question?

on my list (when the Kindle price drops!)

AB I'm happy to lend it to you - shall I see how much it'll cost to post? Where abouts are you?
I have decided though that I am re-buying all my TF books - got rid of them all as I would usually do but I'd like to keep these

oh thanks Stealth.... the 'thing' in Mike Spains attic, was there ever anything there, what about the pebbles from the beach/the skeletons were all these in his head ? and I knew Mike had depression problems as these were all mentioned, but why did Jenny suddenly kill him that night ?

hmm good questions actually
My understanding is - no there was nothing there, or there might have been a mouse or something but he became obsessed by it. Not sure about the skeletons, suppose the implication is that he did it, but that's a bit sloppy.
She killed him because his craziness was taking over their lives and scaring and affecting the kids too.
(might need to re-read bits of it, but I only read it a few days ago)

Thanks-- I really enjoyed it but felt there was not enough reason or explanation as to why Jenny would kill 3 members of her family.. and still not sure why Conor took to hiding in an empty house to spy on them when they were friends anyway

did you read In the Woods - that ends with a huge mystery unsolved. But I loved it. I think that seems to be her thing.
Connor sort of accidentally fell into watching them. he fell out with them, then didn't feel he could make contact again. But loved watching them as they were the perfect family

I will try the woods, as I said i really enjoyed broken harbour just felt confused, I think perhaps I should just read and enjoy and not keep thinking 'would this really happen' it is a story after all.

yes, now you've made me question it, I'm a bit unsatisifed but I don't remember being at the tme iyswim

I read this last week and really enjoyed it, as I have all of her books- but FWIW I do agree about the end being unconvincing. Would Jenny really kill her children because she thought her husband was going mad? Also I wanted to know about the animal in the loft. And the whole evidence planting thing seemed unlikely of a cop who was obsessed with doing the right thing.

Interestingly I enjoyed getting to know Scorcher as a character- he cropped up in the previous book and seemed very two-dimensional, a sort of boring yes-man, and yet here he was real. So the evidence planting was a good plot device ultimately. I wanted to know more at the end about Dina- had he cracked and were they going to seek help for her? such an interesting dynamic.

Despite the points above, I really like her writing and have enjoyed all of her books.

glad you felt the same 'cantdo' about Jenny i just found that so hard to believe, I forgot about Dina, I have to say she really annoyed me (I know she is unwell) but felt Mick ended up doing too much for her, I wanted her to leave Mick alone so he could get some sleep and do his job!

I finished reading this last night, with tears streaming down my face at Jenny's confession. I thought it was excellently written, I could totally believe Jenny cracking like that.

I think you are supposed to always wonder about the animal. Near the beginning one of the floaters mentioned seeing some sort of animal at night.

Such a haunting sort of book that I HAD to see what mn thought of it!