After some traumatic teenaged years in rural Connecticut, Cale and Ambrose Casey had nothing left to say to each other. Cale ran off to Hawaii to sell luxury real estate. Ambrose stayed behind and built up his construction company. Neither thought they’d be in touch again and were glad for it—until they learned of a real estate developer’s plan to drain and expand Gibbs Pond.

Nearly 30 years before, the Casey brothers buried a secret in that pond, which fell somewhere between self-defense and family preservation.

Lily Rowe, the contractor in charge of the dredging, can also trace her roots—and her trauma—to the banks of Gibbs Pond. After a childhood that saw her and her brother yanked across the country by her abusive father, it was here where she finally stayed put, even if they didn’t. But as ambitious as Lily is, and as much as she wants answers of her own, her family also has secrets to protect.

Now, the haunted lives of Cale, Ambrose, and Lily collide once more as they reunite to unearth the devastation of the past.

Praise for The Dredge:

“Flaherty writes with stealthy acuity, his prose seemingly simple yet full of coiled power. . . . Multiple hauntings emerge in ‘The Dredge,’ and you’ll be contemplating them after the last page.”—Sarah Weinman, The New York Times

“Two brothers with a secret and a woman with a job to do (and traumas of her own to reckon with) converge at the site of a Connecticut pond scheduled to be dredged, in this powerful new novel. Flaherty deftly conjures up an atmosphere of dread and suspense, with all roads leading to the pond, and all concerns pointing toward what lies at its bottom. This is an assured, compulsively readable debut.”—Dwyer Murphy, CrimeReads

“In this accomplished debut mystery, Flaherty revitalizes the familiar trope of old secrets threatening to resurface with sinewy prose and well-tooled suspense . . . The past and present unfold gradually from the vantage points of Flaherty’s well-drawn leads, keeping readers on a knife’s edge as the full scope of each character’s history clicks into place. Admirers of Eli Cranor’s Ozark Dogs will be riveted.”—Publishers Weekly

“How these well-drawn traumatized characters and their secrets collide in the present day, permanently changing the course of their lives, is the theme of Flaherty’s beautifully written debut. His Connecticut is not the monied suburbia of Rick Moody and John Cheever, but a rural working-class community more reminiscent of Daniel Woodrell’s Ozark mountain towns . . . this sad novel about the corrosive effects of family trauma and pain will linger in readers’ minds.”—First Clue Reviews

“The Dredge probes the conventional American myth: the past can be reformed and even suppressed so that one can turn a new page in the American Eden and become a new Adam or Eve. The intense story dramatizes how the past always shapes and determines the main characters’ quotidian existence and mental activities. An ambitious, splendid debut.”—Ha Jin, National Book Award winning author of Waiting

“It’s clear that Brendan Flaherty is not here to fuck around. With his debut novel, The Dredge, he catapults us right away into dark family dysfunction with tight, athletic prose reminiscent of seasoned masters like Elmore Leonard and Harry Crews. This novel could’ve been twice as long, but this author knew to stick to the plan with not a wasted word. So, remember the name, Flaherty, folks. He’s here to stay.”—Brian Panowich, International Bestselling Author of Bull Mountain and Nothing But The Bones