SOUNDTRACK: hiatus
[READ: July 2021] Holding
Graham Norton is a fairly peripheral entertainer in our lives I’ve always enjoyed him when I’ve watched him, but I don’t watch him very often. He’s a good (and funny) talk show host, but who knew that he also wrote novels? And not comic ones.
This story is a mystery set in the remote Irish village of Duneen. They have one policeman (guard), Sergeant P.J. Collins who is overweight and alone. Collins is central to the story, as are Brid Riordan and Evelyn Ross.
Brid Riordan is a wife and mother and she is unhappy. She’s been drinking a lot and her husband has been getting on her case about it–even taking the kids away to his mother’s a few times.
Evelyn Ross is the youngest of the three Ross sisters–a wealthy trio of (orphaned and single) women living in a large estate called Ard Carraig. Abigail and Florence are her older sisters and they dote on Evelyn because a) she found their father when he hung himself and b) she was more of less left at the altar.
Nothing much happens in Duneen. The biggest news is the development that’s going up. And what they find when they start to dig the foundation–human bones.
Everyone assumes it is Tommy Burke–who was Evelyn’s fiancée and who disappeared just before the wedding. The story was that someone had seen him get on a bus and head for England. But why had he never come back?
P.J. has no way to determine who it is on his own so he has to call in help from the main office in Cork. Enter Detective Dunne, a man who is full of himself and looks down on the overweight P.J. (there’s some nice police bonding later on).
Small town Ireland knows everyone else’s business especially when there’s huge dustup like the one that happened between Evelyn and Brid over Tommy all those years ago. P.J. doesn’t know any of this because he’s fairly new to the area. So he learns (as we do) about what went on. And how these details make both Evelyn and Brid a suspect.
Even more fascinating is that P.J. finds himself attracted to (and the attraction seems reciprocated) both of these suspects.
The story proceeds in interesting ways, with forensic evidence proving to be no use and then more bones being uncovered. Sometimes people know a lot more than they are letting on. After all, somebody always seems to know what’s going on in a small town.
The climax is genuinely exciting.
I’d certainly read more from Norton.
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