Kala
A Novel
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4.0 • 4 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
A BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR NPR, THE GUARDIAN, THE INDEPENDENT, THE TABLET, AND CRIMEREADS • "An enthralling, evocative and heartfelt mystery" (Chris Whitaker) from a rising Irish talent in which former friends, estranged for twenty years, reckon with the terrifying events of the summer that changed their lives.
"The perfect read for hot summer days and dark nights."—Ruth Ware
"[A] gritty heartbreaker of a thriller…a spectacular read for Donna Tartt and Tana French fans."—Kirkus
“A master class in building suspense.”—The Washington Post
In the seaside town of Kinlough, on Ireland’s west coast, three old friends are thrown together for the first time in years. They—Helen, Joe, and Mush—were part of an original group of six inseparable teenagers in the summer of 2003, with motherless, reckless Kala Lanann as their group’s white-hot center. Soon after that summer’s peak, Kala disappeared without a trace.
Now it’s fifteen years later: Helen has reluctantly returned to Ireland for her father’s wedding; Joe is a world-famous musician, newly back in town; and Mush has never left, too scared to venture beyond the counter of his mother’s café.
But human remains have been discovered in the woods. Two more girls have gone missing. And as past and present begin to collide, the estranged friends are forced to confront their own complicity in the events that led to Kala’s disappearance.
Against the backdrop of a town suffocating on its own secrets, in a story that builds from a smolder to a stunning climax, Kala brilliantly examines the sometimes brutal costs of belonging, as well as the battle in the human heart between vengeance and forgiveness, despair and redemption.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Walsh's engrossing if overstuffed story of lifelong friends revolves around a mysterious death in the tourist town of Kinlough, Ireland. In 2003, a group of teenage friends is shattered when one of the six, Kala Lannan, disappears amid circumstances that are only revealed near the end of the novel. Three of the others reunite 15 years later after Kala's bones are discovered at a local building site. Joe Brennan, once Kala's boyfriend and now a famous rock star, has recently returned to open a bar. Helen Laughlin, who was Kala's best friend and is now a struggling investigative reporter in Canada, learns of the discovery while home for a wedding and determines to solve the mystery of Kala's death. Mush, the glue of the group, still works at his mother's café, and after Kala's remains are found, his two teenage cousins go missing. Walsh unpacks individual events through multiple perspectives, and the novel thrives when Joe, Helen, and Mush grapple with conflicting memories of the past. There are a few too many red herrings, and some woolly hints of a temporal reality in which the characters see versions of themselves at different ages, yet the emotional pull of Walsh's core trio steadies the ship. Despite some wobbles, this is hard to put down.
