The Survivors

Jane Harper is an author new to me, but The Survivors was a decent read to get me through a few rough days. The book revolves around Kieran, a new father coming back to his hometown with his girlfriend and their infant daughter. There is a great trauma and tragedy that haunts this town from Kieran’s past. Though the writing style could have used some finer editing and sharpening, the characters and narrative piqued my interest through the end of the novel. The mystery and suspense is gradually built up over the course of the book and while it isn’t a particularly twisty novel, it is one that kept me reading to find out the end.

The narrative is fairly simple, and not much happens other than the main mystery, which is inevitably tied to events that happened in the town’s and protagonist’s past. We get snippets from the past interweaved with the modern timeline, which was confusing and jerky at times. Harper’s style also tends to be a bit too… descriptive? I’m not sure how to describe it, but it is way too wordy and tends to meander on occasion. Something interesting might happen, and then there will be a few pages of something unrelated or a random thought Kieran has, which may or may not be related. Maybe that was a way to foreshadow, but I didn’t find it effective.

The characters manage to be interesting, even though they could have been developed a bit further. I don’t really get why there is a baby in the story—every now and then, we get the characters interacting with her and remembering that she exists, but I don’t really get ‘parent’ vibes from the main couple. Many of the locals also were one-dimensional, though they played important roles in the plot. I didn’t really get a sense of who Mia was, for example, aside from her being a sidelined careerist. Kieran is perhaps the most interesting since we got to see his inner thoughts and perspective the most. One aspect I enjoyed was the way that certain characters can be grey, and how the characters’ perceptions of each other might be colored by time or their closeness.

What I really enjoyed in this novel, and what made it so compelling, was its themes of trauma and how a community heals as well as keeps secrets. What may seem harmless on the surface might not be in reality, and a town might go to some crazy lengths to keep its reputation. Kieran repeatedly has to struggle with his conception of his deceased older brother, whom he and his family idolized. The book jacket calls this book ‘atmospheric’, and I think it is, at least in part. I have never been to Australia or stayed longterm in a tiny seaside town (with all those secrets), but I got a hint of what it must be like in this novel. The backbiting, neighborly concern, the newcomer disrupting the status quo… it’s all there.

The mystery is a slow buildup for sure. Try the first 50 pages or so, because it isn’t that gripping in the beginning—and the writing style makes it seem even more clunky than it needs to be. The ending isn’t a shocking twist, but it’s not really the surprise (or lack thereof) that made it enjoyable for me—rather, it was the satisfaction of seeing the various pieces of the puzzle come together and seeing the overall picture. For a quick mystery book, it fits the bill—but based on the writing style, I’m not sure I’ll give Harper another chance unless the blurb is especially intriguing.

Jane Harper, who has taken her readers on a crime fiction tour of Australia, takes us to a small coastal town in Tasmania, a place where a ship once sank, taking over fifty people with it. The wreck remains a destination for divers, and a sculpture of three figures that stand above the waves, known as “The Survivors,” is both a memorial and a constant reminder that the sea, which gives the tourist town its livelihood, is both beautiful and cruel. returnreturnKerian Elliot has returned to Evelyn Bay with his girlfriend and infant daughter to help his mother pack up the house he grew up in. His father’s dementia has gotten so severe she can no longer care for him. Kerian rarely visits and is shocked by how advanced his father’s condition has become. Visits have always been fraught, given the shadow hanging over the family. Kerian’s popular older brother drowned in a ferocious storm a dozen years earlier. Kerian is dogged by guilt about the drowning, and the attitude of townsfolk doesn’t help. They blame him for the death of three young men who set out to sea trying to rescue him from a storm-engulfed sea cave before the storm swamped their boat. Both Kerian and his wife Mia survived the storm, but each lost someone close to them: Kerian’s brother Finn and Mia’s friend Gabby, who disappeared on the beach, but whose body was never found.returnreturnThe packing isn’t going well – the baby is making sleep elusive and the father’s confused efforts to help just make things harder. Then the body of a young artist is found on the beach, and the rumors of the past return to swirl around the investigation. returnreturnHarper takes her time developing the story, unfolding the close relationships that knit the town together, relationships that are becoming unraveled as the police struggle to solve the murder with few clues. A popular novelist who knows the town from summer visits has moved in permanently and has launched an investigation of his own. Everyone has a suspect, and Kerian is increasingly feeling the weight of his guilt bearing down. returnreturnThe deliberate pacing gives Harper time to develop rich characters and fill in the town’s past, bit by bit. Always interested in the distinctive landscapes of her setting, Harper makes the people who live in the small town part of the landscape, people shaped by the sea and by their relative isolation, which means everyone has ties to each other, ties that are increasingly strained as the investigation drags on without a breakthrough. Though it wouldn’t be accurate to call this novel a thriller, it’s a compelling and deep examination of themes Harper has explored before: the long term scars of the past in small community, the tensions in families who have suffered a loss, and the corrosive effect that blame and guilt have on survivors of tragedy.

I'm a bit torn on this review. On one hand, the characters had depth, the family drama was interesting, and the crimes were mostly engaging. But on the other hand, I felt like the telling of the story dragged. I didn't feel really into the book until it was more than a third through. I don't think it was helped by the very slow pace of the narrator. I nearly quit a few times.

That said, around the half-way point, I didn't want to stop listening. I mean, it was still very slow going but by then I was too invested in the who-done-it aspect to quit. The focus moves to a cold case instead of the present day murder which kind of made if feel like the young woman had been mostly forgotten about by the author but it all comes together.

The biggest positive thing I can say about The Survivors is that I really wasn't sure who did it until the end. There were a few trails that could have been totally plausible and I felt good about how everything turned out.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to listen!