ANNA CREER reviews Dervla McTiernan’s latest novel that explores the devastating impact of a missing daughter on two families, while highlighting the power of social media to distract and misinform.

Dervla McTiernan gave up her career as a lawyer in Ireland, moved to Australia and decided she wanted to be a crime writer. 

She has published four critically acclaimed crime novels all set in her native Galway.

However, in her first standalone novel, The Murder Rule (2022), McTiernan moved to an American setting, drawing on her memories of working as a law student in Maine, which she claims are “among my brightest and most tightly held”.

What Happened to Nina?, her latest novel, is set in rural Vermont and explores the devastating impact of a missing daughter on two families, while highlighting the power of social media to distract and misinform.

Nina Fraser and Simon Jordan have been a couple since high school but attending different universities has led to separation and tension. 

They decide to go away together for a week of trekking and climbing, staying at Simon’s parents’ holiday house, but only Simon returns.

He tells his parents that, as a result of a quarrel, he had returned home and Nina was going to Boston to visit friends.

When Nina doesn’t make contact, her distraught parents, Leanne and Andy Fraser, report her missing to police. 

In a desperate plea to the public for information, Leanne demands the Jordans allow the police to search the grounds of their holiday house.

The wealthy Jordans decide to hire a PR firm, who specialise in reputation management, to protect their son from gossip and innuendo. 

They start an online campaign against Nina’s parents, planting seeds of suspicion about unsavoury behaviour to distract media attention away from Simon. 

Rory Jordan tells his wife: “What matters is that we keep muddying the waters. What we want is a lot of confusion, we want people to feel like there’s more going on here than meets the eye.”

As a result public sympathy shifts, as conspiracy theories grow and the Frasers’ life becomes a nightmare.

What Happened to Nina? is a disturbing exploration of crime and punishment in a world dominated by the power of social media, culminating in a shocking resolution.

EVEN more disturbing is The Prey by Icelandic author Yrsa Sigurdardottir, who said she started writing crime novels in 2005 to release her “darker side”. 

Her detectives investigate bizarre crimes often involving horrific supernatural elements in life-threatening locations. As a result, her novels are a unique blend of crime fiction with a horror twist. The Prey is no exception.

In mid-December, members of the Hornafjordur Search and Rescue team are searching for four Icelanders missing in the National Park near Hofn. 

Although it’s not unusual for tourists to go missing, it’s rare that Icelanders would choose to trek in the wild at this time of the year.

When Johanna and her partner investigate one of the huts in the area, they discover a woman’s body frozen under the snow. There is no sign of her companions but Johanna feels the presence of something following them across the snow.

At the same time, Hjorvar working lone shifts at the nearby Stokknes radar station is plagued by a child’s voice on the phone asking to be let in.

In flashbacks, Sigurdardottir reveals the horror that the two couples encountered on their trek across the snow, in an atmospheric, complex and totally chilling exploration of encountering the unknown.

AND for something completely different there’s Sir Michael Caine’s debut thriller, Deadly Game.

Caine has starred in over a hundred films and was knighted in 2000 in recognition of his contribution to film. However, he claims in his acknowledgements: “I’ve always enjoyed reading thrillers and had the idea of writing one of my own for years – so I’m glad that life has finally allowed me the time to do it.”

Caine has used a true story about uranium being found by workmen on an East End dump as the basis of Deadly Game, but he’s based his heroic DCI Harry Taylor on his younger self, or at least the characters his younger self portrayed on film.

In Caine’s thriller, the uranium is stolen from the dump in a violent robbery and then it’s a race against time to discover which major criminal organisation was responsible. 

You’ll either shake your head in disbelief or enjoy the rollercoaster ride of Taylor and his team saving the world.