Monday, 27 April 2026

Preserved in Peat

Detective Cormac Reilly returns in Dervla McTiernan's The Unquiet Grave (2025). Reilly and his partner, Constable Peter Fisher, receive a call to say a body has been found in a peat bog outside Galway. Bogs preserve bodies, so initially it is unclear if this is a recent death or an ancient burial. Perhaps it could be the body of Thaddeus Grey, a teacher at a local school who disappeared two years prior and whereabouts remain unknown.

As Reilly and Fisher investigate the crime, they are each holding secrets from the other. Peter is planning to resign and move overseas with his girlfriend, while Cormac has been offered a job managing internal affairs in Dublin. While Reilly would be great at this role, investigating police corruption is a friendless job and he is not sure he wants it. In a further complication, Reilly's ex-girlfriend Emma approaches him for help. Her new husband has gone missing overseas and she is having difficulty getting French police to take it seriously. Reilly has to wrestle with complex feelings as he realises that Emma has moved on and is now living the life he has expected them to share. Meanwhile, there is another crime underway as a creepy computer programmer has plans to cheat the national lottery. When more bog bodies are found, the Garda have to race to figure out whether they are dealing with a serial killer or a copycat.
Reilly is such a good character. He is a committed detective with a strong ethical core and an unwavering gut instinct. He is thoughtful and diligent and has a big heart. I loved the way McTiernan portrayed Reilly and Fisher's relationship and their inability to say what is on their minds.

McTiernan smoothly weaves the various plot threads together. She is expert at pacing, knowing when to trickle out information to keep readers guessing. It is a brilliant police procedural, with moments of thrilling action. Plus, there is the atmospheric Galway weather which adds to the storytelling.

This is the fourth book in McTiernan's Cormac Reilly series, and I suspect it will not be her last. While new readers can safely read The Unquiet Grave without prior knowledge, it is such a great series that I highly recommend starting at the beginning. My reviews of other Dervla McTiernan novels in this series are available on this blog:
I will be seeing Dervla McTiernan next month at the Sydney Writers' Festival where she will be speaking about her forthcoming standalone thriller, Three Reasons for Revenge (2026). I have pre-ordered that novel and am looking forward to it.

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