The Witch Elm - Tana French

Toby, the main character of The Witch Elm, is not likeable. He is arrogant, annoying, selfish, and a real snob. Even after he survives the traumatic near death experience during the robbery of his home it’s still hard to muster up some sympathy for him because he’s just so predictable and privileged. Normally, as readers, we want to relate to the characters we read, or feel some kind of kinship, love, sympathy etc for them. Toby is the opposite of anyone I would want to be friends with (and I have always run a mile when I have encountered people like him in my life), BUT this makes The Witch Elm all the more interesting in my opinion.

I spent the first 200 pages wondering how Toby had been so lucky to have such a warm, welcoming and lovely family, and such an awesome family home in the Ivy House. And wondering why his TBI hadn’t made him re-evaluate his life and become a better person, instead of wallowing in self-pity. Obviously I haven’t personally suffered from a TBI so I have no real idea how that would affect me, it really was just wishful thinking on my part, because I really really wanted to start liking Toby.

I never did start liking Toby, but I loved The Witch Elm. Tana French stepped outside of her Dublin detective novels and took us on a great ride through some intense character development amidst a mystery that I kept thinking I had figured out, but always turned out that I hadn’t, not exactly anyway.

A mystery skeleton in a tree, family secrets, and an old family house shrouded by mystery, with an annoying, highly privileged main character whose lack of memory leads to some interesting revelations: all of this made The Witch Elm unputdownable for me. I’m not so sure why the title was changed (from the British Wych Elm), as witches have no place in this novel, but other than that this book is a solid 5 stars for me!