Without doubt, this is a beautifully written mystery set in Wild Thyme, a rural place in Pennsylvania, policed by Henry Farrell. There are dark regional omens such as rise in burglaries and the arrival of heroin, and low income poor areas, like the Heights, that are proving to be dangerous to frequent. Heroin addicts, Kevin O'Keeffe and Penny Pellings, have had their baby daughter, Eolande, put into foster care. Kevin is struggling with his memories when he tells Henry that he shot a man and Penny has disappeared, although there was blood and patches of her hair in their trailer. This is not a fast paced read, it is a slow paced, character driven story that meanders, with an impressive sense of location, culture and the seasons. It is a read which at times is more interested in looking at people and the rhythms of nature in depth, and the crime feels incidental.

Henry investigates, venturing into areas that do not welcome cops and across statelines with the stealth of the hunter that he is. His wife is dead, and he still hasn't come to terms with it. His personal life revolves around a married woman, Shelly Bray, which he knows is a mistake and so it proves to be. He is close friends with Ed, who runs a construction company specialising in the use of retrieved timber and deploying traditional and time consuming techniques, and his wife, Liz, the local GP. When Kevin who works for Ed is locked up in prison, Henry moonlights by working for Ed so that he can complete a contract. Ed, Liz and Henry play in a band, The Country Slippers, with Henry's instrument being the fiddle. Henry comes to find himself slowly gelling into a relationship with Julie, a woman he works with as a cop and in his construction job with Ed. Amidst all this is the hunt for Penny, a closer in depth look at Kevin to understand precisely what he did and saw, the enigma that is Sage Buckles, and the emergence of a dangerous man who abducts people and is responsible for killing a cop.

I enjoyed the slow pace of this book that is just soaked with rural vibes and real lives. Henry is a flawed and grieving man who is determined to get to the bottom of what happened to Penny and is undeterred that it takes some time to do so. The author gives us a good idea of the people and issues that arise in many rural areas of the US. We observe the jurisdictional policing nightmares, whilst at the same time seeing the team work that takes place when cases cross statelines. This may not be a novel for everyone, I can imagine many who will be frustrated with the slow pace and a plot that is not driven solely by the crime aspects of the story. However, if you are looking for beautiful and atmospheric writing, rural culture and a focus on characters, then this is for you. Many thanks to Faber and Faber for an ARC.

Bouman’s exquisite, mesmerizing debut DRY BONES IN THE VALLEY won the Edgar Award among a host of other accolades, and after a bit of a wait at last we’re back alongside Office Henry Farrell on his beat among the backwoods and byways of rural Pennsylvania. 

Farrell is having a trouble-filled summer in Wild Thyme. While he’d rather be hunting turkey, drinking IPAs, and playing his fiddle, instead he’s busy dealing with the arrival of heroin, a surge in burglaries, and an adulterous fling from which he can’t seem to extract himself. When local handyman Kevin O’Keeffe’s drug-addled girlfriend disappears, and O’Keeffe gives a rambling semi-confession to maybe shooting a man, Farrell’s life gets even more complicated. He’s pulled in all sorts of directions by the various powers in his community, as he tries to sort the truth from everything that obscures. His investigations take him across the state border to the backcountry equivalent of vice-filled back alleyways.  

Fateful Mornings is an interesting, at times frustrating, read. Bouman’s elegant prose and knack for evoking backcountry life in vivid detail is again on show, but this sophomore effort lacks the tension and narrative drive of his debut. Dry Bones in the Valley earned comparisons to rural noir masters like John Hart and James Lee Burke, but in Fateful Mornings Bouman veers more towards James Sallis territory, with formless and meandering plotting, in among lots of lovely description and characterization. He doesn’t quite, yet, have Sallis’s touch for making that work, but there’s still plenty of quality here. 


The plotline is not so much two steps forward, one step back, as one step forward, three to the side, circle back around, and bow to your partner. Bouman's writing is elegant, poetic, and unique, and there's interesting threads of philosophy and different ways of looking at the world threaded throughout, but I can imagine that many readers, whether crime fans or not, may find the storyline's looseness off-putting. I couldn't quite make up my own mind about it, but in the end felt like I admired what Bouman was trying to do rather than fully being engaged in the tale.