False Mermaid

For some reason I thought this was a stand-alone; when I got it home, I realized it was third in a series and also that it was set largely in St. Paul. Since I lived in Minneapolis for many years and worked in St. Paul for some of them, the locales were familiar, which added to my enjoyment. I loved the way Hart melded an all-too-real contemporary murder story with the legend of the seal-woman. If you enjoy this book, I'd recommend you watch John Sayles's wonderful film THE SECRET OF ROAN INISH. You might also like to listen to Jean Redpath's "Song of the Seals" and at least
one version of "The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry" -- Joan Baez, Maddy Prior, June Tabor and Judy Collins have all recorded it and you can download any of them for 99 cents or so on Amazon or iTunes. I now definitely plan to read the previous two books in the series and look forward to more. ( )

My blog post about this book is at this link. ( )

In this, the third instalment of the Nora Gavin/Cormac Maguire mystery series, Nora, a pathologist, has returned from Ireland to Minnesota with the firm intent to finally prove her brother-in-law Peter Hallett guilty of murdering her sister five years earlier. She is very concerned now that her niece is older that she could be in danger from her father as well. She renews her connection with Frank Cordova, the police investigator who was one of the few who believed her, not realizing he believes she is reconnecting on a personal level as well. Nora is shocked to learn that her ex-boyfriend's sister Miranda is about to marry Peter and go to Ireland for their honeymoon. She is afraid that he will kill her the same as he did Triona.

Erin Hart has a wonderful sense of the mystical history of Ireland and how to weave the songs and lore of the islands into her stories whether in Ireland or America. In this book the folklore is mostly tied to the traditional Celtic Selkie stories, and one in particular. The Selkie traditionally is a seal that can change into a human by taking off her sealskin, but if her sealskin is taken, she is trapped in her human form. This is the basis of the legend in this book. The author's descriptions are beautiful, lyrical, and mystical, or they are vivid, harsh, and irrefutable, according to time and place. In other words, her writing is truly atmospheric. Nora and Frank find more evidence pointing to Peter, but there is always something cross-contaminating evidence just enough to blur the facts. Two witnesses are discovered, but the only people they have seen are women. Why would that be? Who is coming to the scene of the crime and what is the connection with another body found three weeks before Triona with the same cause of death and the same distinctive clues? Where do the witnesses fit into the scenario?

As always, Erin builds on the history, mystery and many connections, linking them all together and binding them tight. The tension mounts as Nora and her niece Elizabeth become targeted when Nora returns to Ireland. She has returned to rescue her after learning that not only did Peter and Miranda insist on taking Elizabeth with them on their honeymoon instead of leaving her with Nora's parents as planned, but a phone call from her neighbor in Dublin has alerted her that Elizabeth ran away from the airport when the plane landed in Ireland and they will keep her safe until Nora gets there.

There is an on-going thread about seals throughout the story that takes us from Pacific Ocean to Ireland, tying in the tale of the Selkie. It is as though the seal that Elizabeth knew on the Pacific Coast beach is the same one that appears on the coast of Ireland. There are many highlights in this book, particularly a Fiddle Festival. Trying to solve Triona's murder has opened much more than anyone would have anticipated, the suspense grows to the final outcome. Though this book does not involve archaeology or the bog people, it does involve the forensics of the crime scene, in particular the soil and flora samples. I not only recommend this book, I recommend the entire series for its flavor, mystery, suspense and surprise. ( )

Another good read by Hart - in this last novel, Nora finally returns to the States to solve her sister's murder and reconnect with her family. Nora's romance with Cormac evolves and they confront past and present problems. Hart's various backstories and developed characters make this more than a simple whodunnit mystery. ( )

Nora Gavin has spent the past three years in Ireland, using her skills as a pathologist to find out what happened to several people whose bodies were found buried in peat bogs. Her desire to solve these mysteries stemmed from her own past: five years ago, her sister Tríona was murdered, and her killer was never brought to justice. Nora has always believed that Tríona’s husband Peter committed the crime, but there was no evidence to incriminate him. Now, however, Nora decides to return to America and make one last effort to find out what really happened to her sister. While she unearths new evidence that just might bring Tríona’s killer to justice, her sometime lover Cormac struggles to define his relationship with his father, who has recently come back into Cormac’s life after a long absence.

This is the third book in Hart’s series featuring Nora and Cormac, and it definitely does not stand alone. The unsolved mystery of Tríona’s death is a big factor in the first two books, and this third installment finally explores Nora’s inner conflict in some depth. Although I was eager to learn how the mystery would finally be resolved, much of the investigation itself fell flat. I couldn’t help but question the realism of the whole thing: was it really likely that a bunch of new evidence would turn up so long after the crime? Would the police even be interested in reopening the case at this point? I also didn’t really like the secondary story about Mary Heaney, a woman of Irish legend who was supposedly a selkie. Though I could see how it paralleled the events with Tríona, I didn’t really think it was necessary. That said, Erin Hart has the ability to suck me in with her writing, especially her descriptions of the Irish seaside. I would definitely read more books in this series, but False Mermaid is not a particularly strong installment, in my opinion.