Rebecca Fjelland Davis' 3 favorite reads in 2024

I've read several books by Tana French, and this was my favorite of all.

The ones I've read are all set in Ireland. I'm a sucker for Irish stories to start with, as I can never spend enough time on those green fields and hills, walking by those stone walls, or into those Irish pubs and villages she brings to life. If I hadn't been there, I'd believe I had after reading this book.

French always creates terrific, twisted plots, but what always sucks me to stay in is her characters. They are never, ever two-dimensional and all good or all bad. Here, chapters vary between the point of view of the two main characters, a retired American cop and an Irish village teen--unlikely friends but comrades nonetheless. Both POV's are necessary for this story to reach the depth it does.

The mystery is dark, with no obvious solution, but it held me absolutely needing to find out what happened. When I picked up The Searcher, I had already read its sequel, The Hunger, not knowing The Searcher existed. I recommend both wholeheartedly, but since I can only choose one, The Searcher was among my best reads of the year, hands down.

I've read all of Allen Eskens' novels, and every time I finish one, I think it was my favorite.

Since I read this novel in 2024, it's my current favorite of his, and it skyrocketed to the top of my favorite reads this year. I loaned it out, and can't wait to get it back to reread it, and see how he planted so much in a few hundred pages. I don't reread novels very often, either, but I want to dig through it to absorb how he did this one.

Eskens does not write series, but his characters tie over from one book to another, so I've met the attorney Boady Sanden before. I think Eskens does the best job of writing dark stories of anyone I've ever read; maybe that's because he practiced criminal law for 25 years, and he understands the dark side of humanity.

Boady is our hero in Saving Emma, but he's far from perfect, and Eskens isn't afraid to dive into those dark parts of ourselves, which we can't help but identify with--and that makes this story so discomfiting. I think I read it in two days. Boady Sanden is so thoroughly developed that after I finished the book, I think of Boady as a real person.

This plot is my favorite this year. A mega-church is at the heart of the murder mystery here, and the cult following is an amazing parallel to today's politics and social commentary on megachurches and cults themselves. Dismantling the veneer that masks a narcissistic love of power is horrifying and satisfying at the same time.

If you read Robert Galbraith's Running Grave (I read this in 2023, so I can't include it), I promise you will love Saving Emma.

The House in the Cerulean Sea might be the funniest, most-heart-warming story I’ve read in ages.

It was written as a YA novel, but I think it’s a fairy tale of sorts for all ages (I mean, Stephen King gets by with it, right?). The characters in this story are whackily (the first time I’ve used that word in my life), enigmatic, and sometimes dangerous, and as soon as I met them, I had to see how their lives turned out.

I always think J.K. Rowling created the most wildly creative cast of characters ever, but the magical residents of the House in the Cerulean Sea give Hogwarts a run for the money in the exceptional residents category. The story is a clear, intentional metaphor about confronting society’s small-mindedness and fighting prejudice, but that metaphor is so well-crafted and beautiful—dare I say cerulean—that I never felt that it was banging me over the head like some stories tend to do.

Even Linus, the protagonist, has his deeply-seeded quirks, and I was rooting from page one for him to break free of the system which had controlled his life: obligations as a case-worker, rule-following, and his own conscience holding him back. But his conscience is much like Huck Finn’s: Huck thought he’d go to hell for helping a runaway slave. Linus fears a similar fate in this world if he steps out of line, and I loved him for his struggle, his desire to do the right thing, his longing for love and belonging, and his final decision.

I laughed out loud many, many times during this book. The narrator’s comments, Linus’s internal fight with himself, as well as the Magical house residents’ quips and actions cracked me up over and over, while I ached for everything to come out all right in the end.

I rarely reread, this one will be a staple when I need a laugh and an uplifting escape from the real world.