Book Review: The Dredge by Brendan Flaherty

Debut novelist Brendan Flaherty grew up outside Hartford, Connecticut and later attended Washington University. He earned an MFA from Boston University, where he was the recipient of the Saul Bellow Prize. For a time, Flaherty lived in Hawaii, though he has long since returned to his home state, where he makes his home with his wife and children. Some of these biographical highlights inform his first book, The Dredge.

The story opens in Honolulu, where perpetual bachelor Cale Casey sells luxury real estate, catches waves, and excels at transparent relationships while avoiding true intimacy. Sure, he has a girlfriend—but her days are numbered as soon as she begins talking about a future together and asking pointed questions, such as: “Who are you?” (Translation: Who are you really?) Because answering that honestly would mean divulging the childhood traumas he left behind in Connecticut, along with his mother and brother and the memory of his father. To his way of thinking, the past is best left buried. Literally.

Meanwhile, Cale’s younger brother, Ambrose, still lives in their rural hometown of Macoun, now with a wife, a toddler, and another baby on the way. The owner of a fledgling construction company, Ambrose can’t escape the emotional and financial strains of his growing family—or his longstanding loyalty to the land. This weight grows more oppressive with the news that Gibbs Pond—which connects the Casey property and neighboring terrain—is going to be dredged as part of a development deal. More than the site of his and Cale’s boyhood play and mischief, it keeps the secret that would tether one sibling to the area and send the other running.

Flaherty alternates perspectives between the estranged brothers and a childhood acquaintance (and Cale’s first crush), contractor Lily Roy, who once suffered abuse and abandonment at the hands of her male relations—and who has her own secrets to suppress. Ordered to dredge Gibbs Pond, she invites Ambrose in on the project. But as desperate as he is for the extra income, he knows that doing so could have life-altering (and potentially legal) consequences. In addition to juggling multiple viewpoints, the author skillfully interweaves past and present, slowly untangling a web of unintended crimes and cover-ups (and the resultant misunderstandings and resentments) that tore two families apart and still threaten their livelihoods. 

Brendan Flaherty makes a favorable first impression with The Dredge. More of a slow burner than a propulsive page-turner, the book quietly yet insistently evokes an escalating sense of dread as long-ago secrets are unearthed, proving the point that no matter how far, or how fast, you run (or don’t), you can never truly escape your past—or the people who share it. The story—which recalls simpler, less supervised times and contrasts them with the complexities of modern life—is bolstered by characters who are distant yet distinctive, and whose roiling inner lives weaken their outer ones. If The Dredge is an indication of things to come, Flaherty is an author to keep both eyes on.