Peel me a Book
Let's Peel
In the Woods
Not a classic whodunit. Not a closed case. Not a safe return.
Perfect if you want to get lost in a memory you can’t trust—and may not want back.
Synopsis
“The past is not a box to be checked off and forgotten. It waits.”
A murder mystery wrapped inside a vanished-child cold case, wrapped inside one man’s psyche.
The first of French’s Dublin Murder Squad novels and already the rules are warped—this is a detective who can't detect what’s inside himself.
It's about what we forget to survive, and what comes roaring back.
Mood:
claustrophobic · mournful · cerebral · unreliable
Tone:
lyrical · investigative · haunted · precise
It Feels Like
Body:
like a hollow you step into and realise you were already inside
Tempo:
slow build, with syncopated jolts
Texture:
moss-covered bones, blurred ink, damp wallpaper
A Little Taste
“The wood is all flicker and murmur and illusion. Its silence is a pointillist conspiracy of a million tiny noises … Its emptiness teems with secret life, scurrying just beyond the corner of your eye.”
“I had learned early to assume something dark and lethal hidden at the heart of anything I loved. When I couldn’t find it, I responded, bewildered and wary, in the only way I knew how: by planting it there myself.”
The Aftertaste
Uncertainty that feels like fog in the lungs
Nostalgia weaponised as narrative
A story that refuses to leave clean fingerprints
The ache of not knowing—and needing to know anyway
Peel With a Drink
To Be Read With A cool, earthy Pinot Noir—the kind that tastes like soil and secrets. Not overly bold, not overly sweet. It lets the silence speak.
Best sipped in dim light, when you’re half certain someone’s watching.
Peel With a Reel
Mysteries of Lisbon (2010, dir. Raúl Ruiz) An epic, dreamlike web of identity, loss, and fragmented memory—gorgeously slow, full of secrets, and rich with atmosphere.
The Vanishing** (1988, dir. George Sluizer) A man becomes obsessed with the disappearance of his partner—relentless, psychological, and haunting in its refusal to offer comfort.
Peel with a Beat
Peel me a Book
Or Try:
Patricia Highsmith
if Ripley steals lives, Cassie steps into them.
Let's Peel
In the Woods
Not a classic whodunit. Not a closed case. Not a safe return.
Perfect if you want to get lost in a memory you can’t trust—and may not want back.
Synopsis
“The past is not a box to be checked off and forgotten. It waits.”
A murder mystery wrapped inside a vanished-child cold case, wrapped inside one man’s psyche.
The first of French’s Dublin Murder Squad novels and already the rules are warped—this is a detective who can't detect what’s inside himself.
It's about what we forget to survive, and what comes roaring back.
Mood:
claustrophobic · mournful · cerebral · unreliable
Tone:
lyrical · investigative · haunted · precise
It Feels Like
Body:
like a hollow you step into and realise you were already inside
Tempo:
slow build, with syncopated jolts
Texture:
moss-covered bones, blurred ink, damp wallpaper
A Little Taste
“The wood is all flicker and murmur and illusion. Its silence is a pointillist conspiracy of a million tiny noises … Its emptiness teems with secret life, scurrying just beyond the corner of your eye.”
“I had learned early to assume something dark and lethal hidden at the heart of anything I loved. When I couldn’t find it, I responded, bewildered and wary, in the only way I knew how: by planting it there myself.”
The Aftertaste
Uncertainty that feels like fog in the lungs
Nostalgia weaponised as narrative
A story that refuses to leave clean fingerprints
The ache of not knowing—and needing to know anyway
Peel With a Drink
To Be Read With A cool, earthy Pinot Noir—the kind that tastes like soil and secrets. Not overly bold, not overly sweet. It lets the silence speak.
Best sipped in dim light, when you’re half certain someone’s watching.
Peel With a Reel
Mysteries of Lisbon (2010, dir. Raúl Ruiz) An epic, dreamlike web of identity, loss, and fragmented memory—gorgeously slow, full of secrets, and rich with atmosphere.
The Vanishing** (1988, dir. George Sluizer) A man becomes obsessed with the disappearance of his partner—relentless, psychological, and haunting in its refusal to offer comfort.