The police can find out nothing in the way of leads from this rather strange foursome, nor can they discover anything about the crime from investigating the dead girl's life. The chief suspects in this intriguing murder case are the four students with whom 'Lexie' lived, in a beautiful but dilapidated mansion near the murder scene. In between the two novels, Cassie has left the murder squad and worked undercover for a while, but after being attacked with a knife by one of her targets, she next transferred to the boring (to her) world of domestic violence, which is where she is working, somewhat depressed and at a loose end, at the opening of THE LIKENESS.Ĭassie's undercover life comes back to haunt her in an unusual way when her boyfriend Sam (still on the murder squad) and her old 'undercover' boss Frank, a Machiavellian-like but charming figure, contact her to tell her that a dead body has been found in a dilapidated cottage in a field in the countryside- the body is that of a girl who is identical to Cassie and who is calling herself Lexie Madison, one of Cassie's previous fabricated undercover identities. She was part of the investigating team in Tana French's previous novel, IN THE WOODS, a story that ended in an emotional mess - a fact of which we are frequently but obliquely reminded in the new book, which is a bit frustrating if, like me, you have read the earlier book but can't recall the exact details of how it turned out. The protagonist, Cassie Maddox, is a detective working in the domestic violence department of the Dublin police force.

It is by no means a bad book, just far too long for what turns out to be a predictable storyline.

My first impression on seeing a copy of THE LIKENESS is that it is very long, an impression I retained on having finished it.

Tana french the likeness review