In the Woods and BrewDog's Jet Black Heart
While I was in Brussels on my beer trip, BrewDog contacted me with an offer to be a Duty Manager at their American headquarters. I really hated to leave Pittsburgh, but what are the chances that this epic Scottish brewery would choose my hometown (Columbus, Ohio) as their American home base? The city in which both my brothers and all my parents live? Much as I love Pittsburgh, I couldn't resist making a move to work with BrewDog.
I got back from Europe on May 15, worked two more weeks at Hop Farm in Pittsburgh, and packed up to start at BrewDog on June 4, so it’s been a bit of a whirlwind. I haven’t had a ton of time to read, which makes posting on books tricky. But between two trips back to Pittsburgh in June and an hour round-trip commute every day to BrewDog, I’ve listened to loads of books on CD.
Favorite audio-books of these past couple weeks, hands-down: Zadie Smith’s NW and Tana French’s In the Woods. Both audiobooks are narrated by British readers with killer accents. The one who reads NW is especially amazing; she subtly tweaks her accent to cover so many geographic and socioeconomic distinctions. (Click the links above to hear some audio samples.)
At right, Zadie Smith. Please read everything she's ever written.
NW is the story of one neighborhood in London, traced through the lens of a friendship between two women, from childhood to mid-life crises. In the Woods is a crime procedural. I never read this genre but gave it a go because my very wise sister recommended French's book. Definitely a good tip. (Thanks, Liv!)
The Book: Tana French's In the Woods
You'll probably think that I'm breaking a cardinal rule of book reviews when I tell you that I haven't finished In the Woods yet. I'm right near the end, but I decided to post on the book now so that it's absolutely impossible for me to give away the who-done-it part of the book. I'm not about to risk spoiling the main joy of reading a detective novel for you.
The best part of In the Woods is the friendship between the two main detectives, Cassie Maddox and Rob Ryan. Another highlight is history repeating. As a kid, Ryan's two best friends disappeared in the woods near their house in Knocknaree, Ireland, just outside Dublin. Ryan was with them when they went missing but has complete amnesia of that night in the woods; he remembers nothing before the moment when he was found clinging to a tree, alone, with cuts in his shirt and blood pooled in his shoes. As an adult, he's a detective on Dublin's Murder Squad. He's forced to revisit his childhood trauma when he's called back to his hometown to investigate the murder of a twelve-year-old girl whose body was found in the very woods where he lost his friends as a child.
This set-up is chock full of dramatic intrigue, uncanny coincidences, complicated relationships, and unlikely psychological twists and turns. And I have to say that French really pulls it off.
I've been following Maddox and Ryan through weeks of their investigation. They've considered the girl's parents, of course, following trails from incest to Munchausen by proxy. They discover a decades-old rape as part of their investigation of Dad. They consider the financial motives of a local real-estate developer. They track political leads connected with a group fighting a motorway to run through the woods where the girl's body was discovered. At the urging of the Irish version of The Enquirer, they even rule out Satanic cults and death rituals.
I still have no idea whodunit. French maintains the central suspense of her conceit masterfully, and the novel's primary relationship - between detectives Maddox and Ryan - provides a solid through-line to pull you along as you unravel the complications inherent to this genre.
The Beer: BrewDog's Jet Black Heart
Even if you think that you don't like murder mysteries or crime procedurals, pick up Tana French's In the Woods - it may make you change your mind. And if you live in Columbus, get to one of BrewDog's taprooms - in Canal Winchester, Franklinton, or the Short North - to enjoy a Jet Black Heart while you read it.
The name alone - Jet Black Heart - is enough to recommend this beer as the perfect pairing for a dark murder mystery. That this beer pours nitro makes it an even better fit for a story set in Ireland, since the most famous nitro beer is also Ireland's most well-known brew: Guinness.
The beer pours an almost pitch black, setting an apt tone for midnight murders and the dark psyches featured in In the Woods. True to its nitro blend, a super dense beige head caps Jet Black Heart, settling in at about 1/2". As you lift the glass to your face, you'll catch whiffs of walnuts, dark chocolate, and creamed coffee. (Ok, those aromas may sound a little sweet for a murder mystery, but you're gonna need a little sweetness as you trace the eminently dark and twisted turns of In the Woods.) The taste follows through on the aroma - nutty, creamy, very little alcohol heat, bitter chocolate, blonde coffee, with a touch of raisin-y sweetness (from the Magnum hops?). My favorite part of any nitro stout is the velvety mouthfeel as you sip beer through its thick head. And in Jet Black Heart, that smooth mouthfeel is made even smoother by the addition of some oats in the grain bill.
Shift beers at BrewDog are the best. A Jet Black Heart was the perfect ending to a long workday this week, and the perfect beginning to a commute home with In the Woods.
