He isn't a particularly nice man and has a sexist streak (disliking Cassie for being a woman), but he does allow Rob and Cassie to partner up despite their inexperience and Rob admits most of his decisions are pretty reasonable even if they aren't what he or Cassie would prefer.

Crapsack World: Everything that could have gone wrong, goes wrong, particularly pertaining to Rob, who in the end not only bungles the resolution of the case leading to him being demoted and unlikely to ever move up the ranks again, but loses his best friend and comes to the conclusion he isn't ever going to get the closure he wants to his childhood trauma.

It either doesn't help the investigation or actively makes it worse, and it's made clear that ultimately Rob's own judgment is anything but perfect, given how he was fooled by Rosalind.

Cowboy Cop: Rob dips into this at multiple points in the novel, but it's deconstructed.

Cain and Abel: Rosalind is abusive and controlling to Jessica and Katy, and eventually has the latter murdered when she tries to assert herself.

However, it eventually turns out she's actually a complete psychopath she was jealous and bitter about Katy's aptitude for ballet so she began poisoning her, and once Katy found out and defied her, Rosalind manipulated Damian Donnelly to kill her as revenge. Both Rob and Cassie suspect she may be a victim of abuse.

Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Rosalind pretends to be a sweet and sensitive girl who feels the need to play the part of parent to make up for her actual parents' deficiencies.

Awful Truth: Rosalind, Katy's older sister, is a psychopath who manipulated Damian into killing her out of spite and jealousy, and she had Rob fooled from the very beginning.

Rob hopes he'll be able to solve both cases, though things end up being much more complicated than he first imagined.

Despite many attempts by the authorities at the time, the case was never solved and Rob can't remember anything about the event. Unbeknownst to anyone besides his partner, Rob was involved in an incident where he and two of his childhood friends, Peter and Jamie, went missing in the woods, with only himself being found and the two others still missing to the present day. The book's protagonist, Adam 'Rob' Ryan, is assigned to the case along with his partner and good friend, Cassie Maddox.

The plot concerns itself with the murder of a 12 year old girl in Knockaree, a small town in Ireland. In the Woods is a 2007 mystery novel written by Tana French, and the first in her Dublin Murder Squad series.

Synopsis of in the woods by tana french