Read Ireland Book Reviews
Issue 389 - 8 September 2007
Irish Crime Fiction
The Dust of Death by Paul Charles
Hardback; 23 Euro / 30 USD / 15 UK; 286 pages
The bloodied body of a crucified man is discovered in the Second Federation Church in an Irish Heritage Town on the first Friday of summer. The investigations by Inspector Starrett of the Serious Crime Unit and his young team soon reveal a County Donegal that is not nearly as righteous as its many churches might suggest. The body is that of local master carpenter James Moore, whom Starrett discovers was having a relationship with the wife of the pastor of the same Second Federation Church, and she has mysteriously disappeared. Meanwhile, it transpires that Moore’s own wife had started to get close to her childhood sweetheart. While investigating Moore’s past Starrett learns that the carpenter might have witnessed a local professional villain in action. Starrett is in his mid forties, dresses well, likes a pint of Guinness and is a decade into his third career. The locals say he may have a sixth sense: he’s not so sure but has been eternally grateful when that special something or other has kept him out of trouble and come to his aid while on a few of his cases. As Starrett conducts his meticulous investigation, recently widowed Maggie Keane calls and he has to accept that he still has the same feelings he had for her as a teenager. This is the first book of a major new crime series.
In the Woods by Tana French
Trade Paperback; 15 Euro / 21 USD / 11 UK; 486 pages [Add To Basket]
When he was twelve years old, Adam Ryan went playing in the woods one day with his two best friends. He never saw them again. Their bodies were never found, and Adam himself was discovered with his back pressed against an oak tree and his shoes filled with blood. He had no memory of what had happened. Twenty years on, Rob Ryan - the child who came back - is a detective in the Dublin police force. He's changed his name. No one knows about his past. Then a little girl's body is found at the site of the old tragedy and Rob is drawn back into the mystery. Knowing that he would be thrown off the case if his past were revealed, Rob takes a fateful decision to keep quiet but hope that he might also solve the twenty-year-old mystery of the woods.
A Secret Place by Patricia Rainsford
Trade Paperback; 15 Euro / 21 USD / 11 UK; 376 pages
Gina is on the run from a lot of things, but the one that's going to get her into most trouble is prison. She and two mates are in hiding, depending on her uncle - a man with connections - to get them out of the country, which is going to be pretty tricky - on account of the man with his head blown off whose car the girls were seen running from. Although he's a cop, Rob is on the run in another way: refusing to face facts about his beloved wife's coma. Meanwhile, he throws himself into trying to figure out why the wealthy solicitor, Billy Hendrick, ended up with his brains all over the dashboard of his lovely car and what three young ones, no more than petty criminals, could possibly have to do with it.
Second Burial by Brian Nugent
Trade Paperback; 15 Euro / 21 USD / 11 UK; 280 pages [Add To Basket]
Sergeant Molly Power of the Irish Police Force Murder Squad is on duty when the call comes in. A young African man, Shad, has been attacked and left for dead on the Dublin Mountains. He crawls to the nearest house and raises the alarm, but he dies later in hospital. Shad's injuries are strange and deeply disturbing. Was he the victim of a racist attack, sadism, a punishment, or some mysterious sacrificial ritual? Inspector Quilligan and Molly Power launch a murder investigation - it is like none they have ever experienced before. Shad's younger brother, Jude, is grief-stricken and mystified by his brother's cruel death. He swears a solemn oath to find his brother's killer, but the more he uncovers about Shad's life and relationships outside their Nigerian community, the more he realises how dangerous and twisted some people can be!. In this compelling and moving story of callous murder and a brother's loss, Andrew Nugent brilliantly depicts the cultural diversity of Dublin and with wit and charm reveals the strength of faith and community when confronted with naked ruthlessness. (Also available in Hardback, priced at 25 Euro)
The Four Courts Murder by Brian Nugent
Paperback; 10 Euro / 14 USD / 7 UK; 346 pages
A superbly entertaining and suspenseful debut crime novel from Irish Benedictine Monk Andrew Nugent. When a Dublin High Court judge is found dead - slumped in his chair, his neck snapped by a well aimed kick - many would say he got what he deserved. But Inspector Denis Lennon and Sergeant Molly Power soon unearth a far more dangerous and complex case than simple revenge. There's the handsome, fair-haired young man whose flights of fancy and secret liaisons lead them down many a dark alleyway; the judge with an unusual but lucrative hobby; the strange connection with a rural community; the good-looking Tae-Kwando teacher. Elegant, charming and clever, Andrew Nugent deflates the pomposity of the law, the police force, and Irish rural mythology in a novel as ingenious as it is witty and compelling.
The Colour of Blood by Declan Hughes
Trade Paperback; 15 Euro / 21 USD / 11 UK; 346 pages
Emily Howard is nineteen years old, slim and petite with a pale complexion and a red rose tattoo. She is also missing. She disappeared three days ago, and now her father has been sent photographs of her naked body. He is desperate to find her. So he calls Ed Loy, a private investigator who knows the dark streets of Dublin better than most; a man who will find Emily Howard within twenty-four hours. But locating Emily turns out to be only the beginning. Within hours, Emily's ex-boyfriend is found murdered, and Loy finds himself in a race against time to catch a killer -- and to unearth the many dark secrets the Howard family have kept long buried. Second book in the Ed Loy series.
The Wrong Kind of Blood by Declan Hughes
Paperback; 10 Euro / 14 USD / 7 UK; 330 pages [Add To Basket]
‘The night of my mother's funeral, Linda Dawson cried on my shoulder, put her tongue in my mouth and asked me to find her husband. Now she was lying dead on her living room floor, and the howl of a police siren echoed through the surrounding hills ...' Ed Loy hasn't been back to Dublin for twenty years. But his mother has died, and he has returned home to bury her. Loy soon realizes that the world waiting for him is very different from the one he left behind all those years ago. When an old school friend asks him to investigate the disappearance of her husband, Loy reluctantly agrees. And suddenly in this place where he grew up -- among the Georgian houses, Victorian castles, and modern villas of Castlehill -- Loy finds himself thrown into a world of organized crime, long-hidden secrets, corruption and murder. The first book in the series.
Sweetwater by Paul Charles
Paperback; 10 Euro / 14 USD / 7 UK; 280 pages [Add To Basket]
Christy Kennedy is an Ulsterman living in leafy Primrose Hill and working in vibrant Camden Town. He loves the art of detection, he's addicted to the puzzle of the crime. Now, while recuperating from an injury, he is working on a Missing Person case when an acquaintance of his, Harry Ford, is murdered. The investigation uncovers the lives, loves and disappointments of four university friends, one of whom, a Father Vincent O’Connor, may also be involved in the Missing Person case. However, the suspect list goes beyond this group of friends, when Kennedy discovers just how ambitious one of Ford’s work colleagues was. The young and enthusiastic WPC Dot King joins the team as they try to solve perhaps the most complicated murder any of them have ever worked on.
Cross by Ken Bruen
Trade Paperback; 15 Euro / 22 USD / 11 UK; 284 pages [Add To Basket]
Cross (kros/ noun, verb, & adjective) means an ancient instrument of torture, or, in a very bad humour, or, a punch thrown across an opponent's punch. Jack Taylor brings death and pain to everyone he loves. His only hope of redemption - his surrogate son, Cody - is lying in hospital in a coma. At least he still has Ridge, his old friend from the Guards, though theirs is an unorthodox relationship. When she tells him that a boy has been crucified in Galway city, he agrees to help her search for the killer. Jack's investigations take him to many of his old haunts where he encounters ghosts, dead and living. Everyone wants something from him, but Jack is not sure he has anything left to give. Maybe he should sell up, pocket his Euros and get the hell out of Galway like everyone else seems to be doing. Then the sister of the murdered boy is burned to death, and Jack decides he must hunt down the killer, if only to administer his own brand of rough justice.
Bishop’s Pawn by K.T. McCaffrey
Hardback; 25 Euro / 36 USD / 18 UK; 220 pages [Add To Basket]
Investigative journalist Emma Boylan is shocked to read her own obituary notice. Intrigued, she sets out to uncover who or what is behind the deception. Her investigations lead her to re-examine some reports she'd written as a rookie journalist and one story in particular seems to have a bearing on current events. It concerns the illegitimate daughter of a Catholic bishop who shot herself in full view of a number of witnesses that included Emma. And now, a decade later, some of these witnesses have met with mysterious ends. An unknown killer is on the loose, singling them out one by one. Digging deeply into deeds from the past, Emma follows a trail of corruption and betrayal. Now her name is next on the list. Can Emma stop the killer before she becomes a victim herself?
Borderlands by Brian McGilloway
Trade Paperback; 14 Euro / 20 USD / 10 UK; 230 pages [Add To Basket]
The corpse of local teenager Angela Cashell is found on the Tyrone-Donegal border, between the North and South of Ireland, in an area known as the borderlands. Garda Inspector Benedict Devlin heads the investigation: the only clues are a gold ring placed on the girl's finger and an old photograph, left where she died. Then, another teenager is murdered, and things become further complicated when Devlin unearths a link between the recent killings and the disappearance of a prostitute twenty-five years earlier - a case in which he believes one of his own colleagues is implicated. As a thickening snow storm blurs the border between North and South, Devlin finds the distinction between right and wrong, vengeance and justice, and even police-officer and criminal becoming equally unclear. A dazzling and lyrical debut crime novel, "Borderlands" marks the beginning of a compelling new series featuring Inspector Benedict Devlin.
Please note: Prices were correct at time of original posting but are subject to subsequent change without notice.
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