The Riptide by Gareth Rubin: A Mystery Where the Past Refuses to Stay Buried
There is something particularly satisfying about a mystery that does not give you all the answers upfront. Instead, it leaves you with just enough information to form a theory, only to quietly pull the rug out from under you a few chapters later.
Gareth Rubin’s The Riptide is built around exactly this kind of mystery.
Set in 1804, the story follows Lysander Rose, a young man who has spent most of his life trying to understand what happened to his mother, who was abducted when he was a baby. His search takes an unexpected turn when the people responsible for her disappearance return for him, forcing Lysander to leave behind the life he knows.
What follows is a journey through the Essex coast and the streets of Edinburgh, involving a secret organisation, an exiled king, murder, blackmail and political intrigue. But beneath all of this is a much more personal question: who is Lysander really?
And that, for us, is where The Riptide becomes very interesting.
When the past becomes part of the mystery
Most mysteries are about finding out what happened. The Riptide adds another layer to that question: what if discovering what happened also changes your understanding of who you are, right in this moment?
Lysander’s search for his mother is not simply a hunt for a missing person. The further he goes, the more he realises that his own past may be connected to the larger conspiracy surrounding him.
One of the more unusual elements is a penny-blood chapbook whose story may contain clues about Lysander’s origins. It gives the mystery a story-within-a-story quality and makes you question what is fiction, what is fact and what has deliberately been hidden.
It is the kind of thing that works particularly well in a mystery because the reader is constantly trying to stay one step ahead of the author and the reader.
A mystery that keeps expanding
What begins as a personal search soon becomes something much bigger.
There is the Circle, a secretive organisation that Lysander gets drawn into. Then there is an exiled king, political intrigue and a conspiracy with consequences far beyond one person’s life.
We liked this gradual expansion of the story. Rubin doesn’t throw the entire conspiracy at you at once and confuse you with all the facts, and out of the blue revelations. The pieces come together as Lysander follows one clue after another.
This also gives the book a strong sense of movement. You start with just one question: what happened to Lysander’s mother? and before long you are asking several others like:
Who can Lysander trust?
What exactly is the Circle trying to achieve?
How much of his past has been kept from him?
And perhaps the biggest question…
History, but without feeling like a history lesson
Historical fiction can sometimes become so focused on getting the period details right that the actual story takes a back seat.
That isn’t the case here.
The early nineteenth-century setting gives The Riptide an atmospheric backdrop, but the book remains driven by its characters and its mystery. The movement from the isolated Isle of Ray to Edinburgh also gives the story different shades as Lysander’s world becomes increasingly complicated.
The historical setting isn’t just decoration. It shapes the world of the story from the political tensions to the way information travels and the limited choices available to someone like Lysander.
The real pull of The Riptide
For us, the biggest strength of The Riptide is its ability to make you keep asking questions.
There are plenty of twists and secrets, but the book doesn’t rely only on shock value. There is an emotional thread running underneath the mystery.
That makes the mystery feel personal rather a one-time read.
You aren’t simply following a character trying to solve a conspiracy. You are following someone trying to understand his own story.
And perhaps that is why the title The Riptide feels particularly appropriate. Lysander is constantly being pulled in directions he didn’t choose, by secrets and decisions made long before he had any say in them.
The question is whether he can fight his way back to the surface.
Should you read The Riptide?
Well, duh, if you enjoy historical mysteries with secret societies, political intrigue, layered conspiracies and protagonists trying to uncover uncomfortable truths about their past, The Riptide is definitely worth picking up, and take our word for it, it won’t disappoint you.
It is also a good choice for readers who enjoy the puzzle-box style of storytelling associated with authors such as Anthony Horowitz and Stuart Turton.
If you like books that make you pause and rethink what you thought you knew, give The Riptide a try. Pick up a copy, settle in, and see if you can figure out the mystery before Lysander does.
