Mystery/Thriller Reading Friends discussion

Chapters 10-13 (to the end) discussion of The Witch Elm -spoilers welcome on this topic.
If the first to post, please briefly summarize to guide the discussion.
What did you think of the book?

Chapter 10
Toby wakes up after the evening with his cousins, hungover and believing he may have murdered Dominic and forgotten. Hugo serves him a late breakfast. Toby tells him that Melissa has left and winds up telling him everything that passed with his cousins last night. Hugo says, “This has gone far enough” and tells Toby he’ll straighten it out.

Toby takes a long, ruminative shower. When he emerges he finds the detectives are at Ivy House. He assumes they’re there to arrest him, but they’re taking Hugo who’s confessed to being responsible for Dominic’s death. Toby objects strenuously and wants to get Hugo a lawyer, but he refuses all help. After a day of worrying, Toby calls Susanna. She tells him not to tell anyone. She warns him again about Leon, who thinks Toby did the murder. Susanna thinks if Leon is stressed any more he might go to the police and implicate Toby. She says “whatever Hugo is doing, it gives us the best shot” at avoiding prison.

The police keep Hugo overnight. Later Rafferty calls and says Hugo has collapsed and is being taken to the hospital. Toby sits with Hugo in ICU. He can’t say everything he wants because Rafferty is in the room the whole time—Hugo is in police custody. Other family members arrive and it becomes a deathbed scene. Leon tells Toby that Susanna’s been manipulating him not to speak to Toby, same as she’s been manipulating Toby not to pressure Leon. The cousins don’t know if Rafferty has believed Hugo’s confession. Hugo dies with the family around him.

Chapter 11
Toby returns to Ivy House. He blames himself for Hugo’s death—if he hadn’t told him the whole story, Hugo wouldn’t have confessed. There’s a funeral and Hugo is cremated. Toby broods and tries to dredge up memories to figure out if he did the murder and, if so, why.

Toby invites Leon and Susanna over. Susanna tells of Dominic’s escalating harassment during their last school year, her rising fear and feeling there was no way out. She went to Toby, but he was no help. Susanna thinks Dominic thought she was a jinx because she wouldn’t help him study for exams (when the harassment started) and then he failed exams.

Dominic violently assaults Susanna and she goes to the police who blow her off. Susanna fears Dominic will follow her to university. She carefully plans how to kill Dominic, dispose of the body, and make it look like suicide. She uses bits of other people’s stuff (Hugo’s coat, Toby’s hoodie) to spread any suspicion around. She and Leon practice getting the body into the tree.

Toby accuses Susanna of organizing the burglary to get his camera, but Susanna tells him she had nothing to do with it. Susanna and Leon talk about how murdering Dominic made them different people: empowered, more able to become what they are.

Chapter 12
Toby goes on in Ivy House. The house is gradually deteriorating and so is Toby: too much Xanax, too little food or rest. Toby is fading; when he thinks of his cousins they’re “drawn in strong, indelible black. . .Dominic’s death defined them.”

Rafferty comes over, walks in the unlocked front door, and startles Toby on the terrace. He says Toby looks bad, advises him to go live with his parents and go back to work. They talk about the Gouger incident and Toby admits he faked the Twitter buzz using fake accounts.

Rafferty says Hugo was a suspect from the beginning. Among other things, Hugo had let the cousins climb the wych elm years ago, but hadn’t let Susanna’s kids climb it—after Dominic was in the hole. Toby realizes Hugo deliberately sent Zach off to look for treasure in the tree. Rafferty says they had everything they needed against Hugo except motive. Until a few days ago when Susanna came to the detectives and said she’d told Hugo about Dominic’s harassment. On the night Dominic died, Susanna says she looked out the window and saw Hugo dragging something heavy.

Rafferty tells Toby there’s a loose thread: Dominic received emails from an unidentified account, a girl saying she really liked him but didn’t want to let on so she’d been rejecting him in public. Susanna denies she sent any emails. Rafferty remembered the fake tweets Toby had sent during the Gouger affair. Plus there was a time in school when Toby and Dec sent another boy prank emails. Rafferty says, “. . .whoever wrote the emails helped to sucker Dominic into getting himself killed.” Toby realizes Rafferty doesn’t believe Hugo did it, he is there to get Toby to tell about Susanna and Leon. He asks Rafferty why he came after Toby, not Susanna or Leon. Rafferty tells him it would have been hard to get a conviction for Susanna or Leon, but Toby, in his disabled state, would be believable to a jury as the killer.

Enraged, Toby punches Rafferty. Rafferty fights back and there’s a brawl. Toby punches him and slams his head into the ground: “. . .he was never going to grab me again he was never going to do anything to me again, never, never.” Toby curls up on the ground next to unconscious Rafferty and falls asleep. When he wakes up next to dead Rafferty, Toby waits for the transformation that Susanna and Leon had talked about—a feeling of power or vindication. Instead he’s miserable: there’s no talking his way out of this. He tries to kill himself with all his pills.

Chapter 13
Toby wakes up in the hospital. He had left a final voicemail for Melissa and she called his parents. The police question Toby but he has a good lawyer. On the voicemail he’d said Rafferty had “snuck up” on him and scared him. His court defense is that he was startled by Rafferty, had a PTSD flashback, and fought Rafferty in what he believed was self-defense. Ironically the very disabilities Rafferty had said would make him seem to a jury like a plausible murderer now provide him with a believable defense. He’s sentenced to 12 years, 10 suspended, and sent to a mental hospital.

Detective Martin comes to visit. He has suspects in Toby’s burglary/assault. Toby identifies one of them from a photo line-up. Toby believes Tiernan set up the burglary but Martin says no, the detectives have investigated. Martin is short with Toby with references to his having gotten away with murder. He says, “whoever gave you that bang on the head did you a favor.” If it hadn’t happened, Toby would be in prison instead of a cushy mental hospital. He has no right to be upset about Tiernan not getting what he deserved.

Toby is discharged. Ivy House has long been sold. Toby gets a job he can manage. The sense of loss he experiences is more about place than people. He moves often because he always ends up feeling edgy in an apartment and moves on. He believes that “of all the possibilities, this is at least far from the worst.” Toby still believes himself to be a lucky person and that his luck is an integral part of himself; it’s colored everything he’s done. If he still exists without it, then what is he?

I think there are some interesting resonances in these last chapters, but also some parts seemed contrived.

As Hugo is dying, Toby and Leon finally speak to each other and discover that Susanna has been manipulating both to keep them out of communication with each other. This and Susanna's assertion that Hugo's confession "gives us our best shot" brings to mind her self-confessed ruthlessness. Nothing is said about this aspect of her before the murder, but I've gotta think that it didn't spring up as a fully formed trait only at that time. And if we accept Susanna as ruthless, wouldn't that affect others' reaction to her reported harassment? Maybe that was an aspect of the lack of rallying around her when she told others. She may have seemed strong enough to deal with it. I'm not trying to blame the victim, just pondering the interactions and relationships that were a theme throughout the book.

Hugo's death, while expected from early in the book, was still very sad. It was in keeping with the loss of the cousins' lighthearted fun-filled vacations at Ivy House.

French is very evocative in portraying the loss of those times and childhood innocence by showing the destruction of Ivy House after the discovery of the skeleton. First there's the loss of the wych elm, central to everyone's childhood and leaving a hole in the view. Then decimation of the garden to what seemed at times like a war field, stripped bare and cratered. At other times it evoked a gothic novel with the bleak, bare moors and the brooding house full of strange creaks and scrabbling. The house suddenly deteriorates when Hugo is gone. This seemed a bit contrived to me. French keeps the timeline fuzzy, but it can only have been a few weeks and now the house has a major leak, reeks of mildew, and can't be kept warm. Or is that just unreliable Toby's perception of it? The house goes from charmingly homey to decrepit as soon as Hugo is no longer present.

Is Rafferty truthful when he says he didn't truly suspect Toby of the murder? If not, wasn't it cruel (and unethical) to make Toby think he was suspected just to shake everyone else up? If Rafferty truly didn't think Hugo was the type of man to murder, that only leaves Susanna and Leon as suspects within the family. Could Rafferty truly be so cynical as to pursue Toby only because he'd have a better chance to get a conviction with Toby in front of the jury?

No wonder Toby wants to kill him, but I didn't buy the fight at all. Are we to believe that a deteriorating man with mobility and mental issues, self-medicated to the gills, who hasn't been eating or sleeping, would be able to outfight a healthy policeman? Or are we to believe in the extraordinary strength of the mentally ill? Alternatively, isn't it more likely that after Toby's first punch, instead of fighting back, Rafferty would throw on the handcuffs and thank his lucky stars he has a reason to arrest Toby?

Lots of bullying going on in this story. Dominic is the most obvious, but Toby (and Dec) bully by sending the false emails. Susanna, Leon, and Rafferty bully Toby by making him think he is suspected, or even guilty, of murder. It makes me think about the relationships and the shifting power differentials. I think that's the source of the euphoric feeling Susanna and Leon have after the murder. Finally they have the upper hand.

You've gotta wonder about trust issues in this family, among the cousins anyway. As kids they commit a lot of mischief behind Hugo's back. Toby dissembles reflexively, trying to make the best impression, maintain good relationships with the "in" group at school. As adults, Toby is much the same, at least until the assault. And Susanna and Leon are keeping a major secret. I think Melissa got a glimpse of the complicated relationships on the horrible evening on the terrace and decided to leave this bunch alone. I think it's creative of French to portray a family with problems without going into a lot of stereotypical "dysfunctional" stuff.

I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and we'd find out that the assault had something to do with Dominic's murder. After realizing that was a red herring, I hated being left not knowing if it was random or had to do with Tiernan. Another (though less significant) echo of In the Woods. Was Detective Martin being deliberately obstinate with Toby on this issue, just to frustrate him?

I've forgotten to talk about luck. When Dominic was first introduced I thought he was very similar to Toby: athletic, attractive, lots of friends, and "lucky." I thought it was interesting that Susanna thought he'd escalated his harassment of her because he thought she was a jinx. (That's why I included that line in the summary.) Later we find out that Toby's emails were the cause, but Susanna is perceptive enough of Dominic's reliance on luck to realize that when he was thwarted he might have attributed it to a jinx and she was right there in that role.

Then Toby ends the book as he began it: averring his luck after assault, disability, destruction and death, a stay in a mental hospital (could have been prison), and ongoing lifelong problems. In the face of all that he still has to think himself lucky because without it, what would he be? I found it eerie that the book ends, after all that’s happened, with Toby's opening-line opinion of himself.

Ann said on another thread: "I’m intrigued by Toby. He is a mystery upon himself in that both friend Declan and cousin Leon are jealous of his “skating through life, unscathed”; yet friend Sean and cousin Susannah are mildly amused by him without expecting much."

Ann, I had to move your comment to Spoilers to the End because I think the nature of all parties and therefore the reason for the difference in the cousins' and the friends' opinions doesn't become clear until we find out whodunnit.

Originally I thought French was being a little too symmetrical in setting up two friends and two cousins but I think she did it on purpose to highlight the duality of Toby's nature. As you say, there's two reactions to Toby among those closest to him and I think it's because each pair contains a member with great internal strength and one with fewer inner resources.

Declan and Leon resent Toby's ability to slide out of any bad situation with little or no consequence because they've each had ongoing, long-lived, daily victimization at school--and possibly elsewhere--for issues they can't help or can't change. Declan, from the "wrong" social class and Leon, gay, don't get a chance to slide away from conflict they didn't ask for. Toby, on the other hand, whatever he does (or doesn’t do) is able to skate by. Declan and Leon have negative returns just for being who they are and are bound to be resentful. There's no difference of any real substance between them and Toby, so why does he get away with it? There’s often a clearer view from the underbelly of a social order and Declan and Leon must have had many chances to witness Toby's cut corners and slick tap dancing with the truth.

Sean is the most stable younger character in the book. He's unshakeably equanimous and reasonable. He has physical strength and the judgment to contain it. He's a strong character. At first glance, Susanna doesn't seem to have the strength that would lend her confidence. To Toby she and Leon seem an equal—and lesser—pair. But in planning the murder Susanna showed her toughness in intelligence, tenacity, and cunning. She too is a strong character although she hides her strength beneath a bushel of suburban ordinariness. It would be easier to like her if she'd used her strength to do anything besides murder, but then we wouldn't have a book

Coming from places of power and confidence, Sean and Susanna can afford to find Toby amusingly, charmingly elusive. He's unlikely to ever hurt or betray them with his slickness because they don't have to depend on him or his good opinion. In fact, Susanna controls Toby through manipulation and not only keeps him from sliding away from suspicion but winds him up with self-doubt.

Before the assault Toby was really good at presenting the face that would be the most useful in any situation. After, when he’s trying to play detective, he’s lost a lot of that ability.

Regardless of how sorry I felt for Toby when Martin was needling him in the hospital, Martin had a point. Toby really did slide away from the full extent of the law in genuine Toby-fashion. No actual untruths, just presentation of an alternate version of the facts using Toby’s incompetence to let him slip away from the full consequences of murder.

“In the midst, an elm, shadowy and vast, spreads its aged branches: the seat, men say, that false Dreams hold, clinging beneath every leaf.”

This section of the book got me to thinking about Hugo's quote (I think it was Virgil) about a wych elm standing at the gates of the Underworld.

The Hennessy's wych elm certainly brought them to the gates of hell. Before the discovery of the skeleton, they're an ordinary family, even a fortunate family. Toby was assaulted, but might have better recovered if he'd had peace and time. Hugo had cancer, but every family has to deal with death. On the other side of the wych elm, Toby has a breakdown, Hugo feels compelled to confess to a murder he didn't commit, and Toby comes to know his cousins as murderers. Their lovely childhood garden is reduced to a hellish, bleak, and barren landscape.

I wonder, had the elm not been there providing such a convenient place of concealment, would Susanna have committed the murder? She'd already thought of and dismissed other means of body disposal. The elm made murder easier.

I'm also intrigued by the wych elm and the genealogy theme. Throughout the book Hugo and Toby work on a genealogy case in which a woman will learn facts about an ancestor that may be disturbing. "At least he's not a murderer," Toby says of the client's illegitimate grandfather and Hugo points out that, regardless, the person she thought her grandfather was will be forever shattered.

The Hennessy's family tree--the literal one in the garden--contained a really unpleasant finding that forever changed the family. They lost their family home (though some of the older generation didn't want to keep it anyway.) The relationship of the cousins can never be the same. Regardless of what Toby says at the end about the immutability of his luck, he's a profoundly altered man, not just due to the injuries from the assault, but also to the revelation that his mind can be toyed with not only to make him think he's murdered, but to actually make him kill someone.

I'm enjoying discussing this book but will be very glad when I never have to type wych again and have it autocorrect to “which’ over and over and over again. :)

Wow, I finished and this part was so long and so much happened, it’s hard to wrap my mind around all this!

Hugo confessing to the murder and later dying was so emotional for me. I knew he was confessing to protect a family member. To the end, he was a good guy. Tied to Ivy House and never able to move on. At least his sacrifice wasn’t for nothing.

Susanna’s confession did not surprise me. She definitely had the brains. And the story she told about the doctor sent warning bells off for me. . I had a feeling Dominic may have been harassing her. But I thought Hugo helped her put the body in the tree. I also thought there had to be more to her giving up her ambitions to marry and start a family. The thing I find interesting is how her and Leon were able to do all this, intricately plan it, and never seem to feel any guilt over it. Wow, such anger and rage to be able to commit this!

And Toby, what a mess! I think Rafferty saw Toby as the weakest, the one he could lean on and possibly break, get a confession. But Rafferty underestimated Toby! I could see Toby killing Rafferty because I think Toby became unhinged. Throughout the book, his mental state was deteriorating. He was lucky to escape prison. But to call himself lucky at the end was a stretch and ironic!

The last part was a crazy, wild ride! I agree with you , OMalleycat, that the book is a 3 star read. It was slow and far fetched at times.

Geri wrote: "Wow, I finished and this part was so long and so much happened, it’s hard to wrap my mind around all this.."

Geri, I agree. I remember when we were well along in the book and nothing much had happened. The first third or so was all setting the scene, then the end is so full of incident it’s overwhelming.

Geri also wrote: “Hugo confessing to the murder and later dying was so emotional for me. I knew he was confessing to protect a family member. To the end, he was a good guy.

I liked Hugo but I was troubled by his apparently knowing something about the murder and concealment of the body but not saying anything at the time, even to the kids themselves. As an uncle, his barely-there supervision provided the kids with carefree holidays but I can’t help but think that kind of diffidence is also what kept him unmarried and living in the same house all his life. Hugo was anything but a man of action. I like that French’s well-defined characters remain consistent throughout her books. This personal trait of Hugo is both an asset and a weakness depending on the situation, just like real life.

Geri said: “Susanna’s confession did not surprise me. She definitely had the brains. And the story she told about the doctor sent warning bells off for me.”

I totally missed this connection. I thought the story of the doctor was just an illustration of her activism and assertiveness. I didn’t think of it as an indication she was capable of murder. Looking back, you’re totally right. It showed her ruthlessness, lack of guilt, and ability to keep a secret, even from her husband.

Geri also said: “The thing I find interesting is how her and Leon were able to do all this, intricately plan it, and never seem to feel any guilt over it. Wow, such anger and rage to be able to commit this!

I guess both of them had life effects from the murder. Leon’s life especially seems to have been immature (stuck in teen-agerhood). But it’s disturbing to think these two relatively normal teens murdered and just went on without major guilt or devastation. In fact, they felt that killing Dominic had empowered them!

Yes, Dominic had definitely tapped their rage. But I didn’t buy that no adult intervened when Susanna and Leon went to them. Especially the police when Susanna went to them with not just sexual harassment, but physical assault. Their unwillingness to tell adults was also a factor—it always is—but Dominic’s bullying went far beyond taunts, well into physical threat.

And this also makes me wonder about the not-immediately-apparent dysfunction in the family. The parents are barely there throughout the book. Leon, if he wasn’t out to his family, may not have wanted to go to his parents or Hugo, but it’s a shame if Susanna didn’t feel she could go to a parent.

Geri said: “But Rafferty underestimated Toby! I could see Toby killing Rafferty because I think Toby became unhinged.

I just didn’t buy this, mostly because of Toby’s lack of physical strength, and it’s such a major part of the end story that it tainted the whole book for me.

Geri decided: “. . .the book is a 3 Star read. It was slow and far fetched at times.

I was most disappointed that French’s machinations showed in this book. Several times it seemed obvious she was setting up situations or incidents to make the story go where she wanted it to go. She’s usually seamless, even in a book like The Likeness where the entire premise was unlikely. In the few days since I’ve read it, it’s occurred to me that perhaps the slow pace of the book made the seams show more than if it had been a pageturner.

Jan: Your summaries of the chapters are simply fabulous. I really appreciate them and the huge amount of work it took to write with such finesse and insight! Thank you!
I just finished reading the book and have so much to say but need sleep! I will be back with so many thoughts they are tumbling all over themselves. “At least I had Ivy House” the true meaning of this statement of Toby’s in the end is not what I expected at all as I read

OMalleycat wrote: "Geri wrote: "Wow, I finished and this part was so long and so much happened, it’s hard to wrap my mind around all this.."

Geri, I agree. I remember when we were well along in the book and nothing ..."

You make good points about the family dysfunction or lack of parental support. And the police not taking Susanna’s complaint seriously was far fetched to me. It was just a way for French to justify Susanna taking things into her own hands. Hugo was a complex character. I mostly felt sorry for him. But I do see how his inaction didn’t help the situation. Before he died, though, he was spurred to action. To help protect his family. Still so sad for me!

Ann wrote: "Jan: Your summaries of the chapters are simply fabulous. I really appreciate them and the huge amount of work it took to write with such finesse and insight! Thank you!
I just finished reading the ..."

Ann, I felt the same way after finishing the book. Too many things to mull over!

Ah!! Finally finished last might. So many things to say I’m sure I’ll forget to mention things.

O’MalleyCat- thank you for all the detailed summaries! I agree with you that there some contrived gaps in bits of the story that seems a bit far fetched. Mostly the fight at the end just didn’t make sense to me for the obvious reasons you mentioned. Also it just made me mad! I felt like Toby just wanted to do anything that would make him feel included with Leon and Susannna. I know there were other aspects of his experiences with Rafferty that went into his anger towards him but I feel that his feelings of being left out with his other cousins pushed him over the edge. French was playing with themes of privilege in this book and how various scenarios can manifest amongst privileged individuals. The extreme issue he had about being left out rang very whiny and privileged to me. Toby’s arrogant and naive qualities really irritated me throughout the book and I couldn’t help smiling when Martin spoke to him at the end.

Hugo dying was so sad, especially knowing he was covering up for his niece and nephew. However I did find it hard to believe that he knew the whole time and did literally nothing at all.

Poor Melissa.. she clearly got a good look at the major dysfunction and was like “I’m out!” I also liked that French was able to show a dysfunctional family without any common tropes. It made it seem more relatable (until the murder part...).

I like the idea of the wych elm being that door to the underworld and how that concept manifests itself as the story goes on. I also wonder what would have happened if the tree wasn’t there and what Susanna would have done.

Overall this was a definite 3 star rating. Too slow for such a long book. Though this group chat has definitely helped me better evaluate parts of the book after the fact!

Karly wrote: "French was playing with themes of privilege in this book and how various scenarios can manifest amongst privileged individuals. The extreme issue he had about being left out rang very whiny and privileged to me. ."

Karly, this is a good insight that I hadn’t fully realized before you said it. What Toby considered his “luck” is really an indication of privilege. While his cousins share that privilege in the sense of having comfortable upper-class lives, they are underprivileged at school because of not being in the “in” crowd. Toby includes them with an adolescent noblesse oblige, but his sense of superiority blocks his ability to have empathy with their very real problems.

Privilege also explains some of the behavior of the police who manipulate Toby ruthlessly and don’t take Suzanne seriously when she goes to them about Dominic’s harassment. Resentment of the kids’ privilege makes the police unsympathetic.

And a theme of privilege takes me all the way back to the beginning of the book when Toby’s gallery was doing a show of underprivileged kids’ work. As I recall, the benefits of this were largely couched in how good it would make the gallery look and how much favorable publicity the show would garner. This exploitation guised as “good works” becomes ultra-exploitative when Tiernan secretly uses the show to promote his own art, followed by Toby creating fake buzz on social media to enhance his reputation as a publicist, completing the circle of an elite bunch using a poor kids’ art to pursue their own goals. Yech.

Yes! And the theme even reaches to Susanna’s story of the doctor - privileged male doctor in a position of authority and power taking advantage of women until she attempts to expose him. Additionally, I had no idea that Irish law (until May this year, as the authors note says at the end) prevented pregnant women from making their own decisions regarding care. Crazy! I think having this theme throughout also shines light on why French had Leon and Susanna be the male and female opposites of Toby. Susanna loses privilege by being a woman, Leon loses privilege by being gay. Toby has no way to ever have insight into how they would experience life, and never attempts to take a minute to put himself in their shoes.

Karly wrote: "Yes! And the theme even reaches to Susanna’s story of the doctor - privileged male doctor in a position of authority and power taking advantage of women until she attempts to expose him. . . French had Leon and Susanna be the male and female opposites of Toby. Susanna loses privilege by being a woman, Leon loses privilege by being gay. Toby has no way to ever have insight into how they would experience life, and never attempts to take a minute to put himself in their shoes.”

You’re absolutely right on all points. Thanks for casting a whole new way for me to look at the book. And wasn’t the law regarding pregnancy care awful? I’m glad it’s been changed. When I read that section I was so startled I had to stop and think that, no, French wouldn’t make things like that up and no, this book isn’t set in the 1950’s, so this is true in our times! Crazy indeed.

Jann and Karly: I’m feeling left out that the author’s note was not included in the audio version I listened to. The Irish pregnancy rule that you both have cited is (was) horrible. I’ve been unable to pull myself together to add my final comments yet but will because this book haunts me still.

Ann wrote: “I’ve been unable to pull myself together to add my final comments yet but will because this book haunts me still.."

I’ve been wondering when you were going to come back and comment, Ann. I thought perhaps you’d gotten lost in a wych elm knothole.

OMalleycat wrote: "Later we find out that Toby's emails were the cause..."

This probably reveals something about me, but I was totally on board with the murder once Susanna explained what was really going on. I found the hopelessness of her position very believable. But when the emails from Toby to Dominic were revealed, I was gutted! After the first email, Dominic believed everything he did to Susanna was at her request. I know Dominic was a bad guy anyway based on how he harassed Leon and Susanna before the emails, but the justification for the murder disappeared. I'm really glad Toby never told Susanna and Leon about the emails because then I feel like they would have been wrecked. All that guilt and remorse they never felt would have caught up with them and created doubts in every part of their existence.

For me this eclipsed everything else in the book. This beautiful, shinning act committed by Susanna and Toby to remove an evil from the world was based on a false premise. Devastating!

Shannon- yes, yes; gutted is a good way to put it. Toby and his devil may care / happy go lucky attitude skating through life not noticing his cousins were maliciously harassed, or that his own jokes went too far or that his actions have consequences was exposed as the cause of the murder of Dominic and indirectly the terrifying harassment of Susanna.
Karma? or the likelihood increases for someone else getting their revenge from the attack in his apartment and as aftermath from killing someone himself.

Shannon wrote:”This probably reveals something about me, but I was totally on board with the murder once Susanna explained what was really going on ..
But when the emails from Toby to Dominic were revealed, I was gutted"

Wow. I have a question though: all of her books have a supernatural element. I felt that a bit of that in this but I would like some feedback. What was the big owl(?) that attacked the main three when they were having their serious discussion? Throughout the whole novel people are hearing things and seeing dark shadows in the garden. In every book Tana French has some supernatural ish thing going on- what do we think this is?

Alexandra: I love the supernatural elements in Tana French's books and look forward to the next one. The owl in the garden was creepy and menacing and I suppose I took it for granted that it was an owl at the time. In retrospect, it could have been an omen - it certainly broke up the discussion and things were not the same afterwards.