Crime Always Pays: Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One Before …

As all three regular readers of this blog will be aware, I published my latest opus, CRIME ALWAYS PAYS this week – or rather, had it published on my behalf by the lovely folk at Severn House (I’m talking about the UK edition here; it will be published in the US and Canada in July). The story features most of the same characters (aka reprobates) who previously showed up in THE BIG O, and even though it can be read as a sequel, CAP is basically your common-or-garden comedy crime caper trans-Europe road trip with a homicidal Siberian wolf-husky along for the ride. Stop me, as they say, if you’ve heard this one before …

Karen and Ray are on their way to the Greek islands to rendezvous with Madge and split the fat bag of cash they conned from Karen’s ex, Rossi, when they kidnapped, well, Madge. But they’ve reckoned without Doyle, the cop who can’t decide if she wants to arrest Madge, shoot Rossi, or ride off into the sunset with Ray …

  CRIME ALWAYS PAYS is my fifth novel, and it’s by some distance the book I had most fun writing. I sincerely hope people have as much fun reading it. If you’d like a very short taster, Chapter 1 can be found here …
  Finally, and as you might imagine, I’m very keen to spread the word about CRIME ALWAYS PAYS, and I’d be very grateful indeed if you could find the time to click on one of the buttons below. Much obliged, folks …

Come Ye Back, Danny Boy

I don’t know if there’s room in the world – or need, for that matter – for more than one Irish crime writer who hails from Sligo, but I’ll go ahead anyway and let you know that Dan Kavanagh re-releases the Duffy novels early next month. Here’s the blurb elves on the first, aka DUFFY (Orion):

Things aren’t going so well for Brian McKechnie. His wife was attacked in their home, his cat was brutally killed and now a man with a suspiciously erratic accent is blackmailing him. When the police fail spectacularly at finding out who’s after him, McKechnie engages the services of London’s most unusual private eye. Duffy is a detective like no other. A bisexual ex-policeman with a phobia of ticking watches and a penchant for Tupperware. But what he lacks in orthodoxy he makes up for in street-smart savvy and no-nonsense dealings. Intrigued by McKechnie’s dilemma and the apparent incompetency of his ex-colleagues, Duffy heads to his old patch, the seedy underbelly of Soho, to begin inquiries of his own. Helped by some shady characters from his past, Duffy discover that while things have changed in the years since he was working the area, the streets are still mean and the crooks walk arm in arm with the blues. Full to bursting with sex, violence and dodgy dealings, DUFFY is a gripping and entertaining crime novel with a distinctly different and entirely lovable anti-hero.

  So who is Dan Kavanagh, I don’t quite hear you breathlessly ask?

Dan Kavanagh was born in County Sligo in 1946. Having devoted his adolescence to truancy, venery and petty theft, he left home at 17 and signed on as a deckhand on a Liberian tanker. After jumping ship at Montevideo, he roamed across the Americas taking a variety of jobs: he was a steer-wrestler, a waiter-on-roller-skates at a drive-in eatery in Tucson, and a bouncer in a gay bar in San Francisco. He is currently working in London at jobs he declines to specify, and lives in north Islington.

  There you have it. There’s an excerpt from DUFFY to be had over at Dan Kavanagh’s web-lair here, where – curiously – it is suggested that if you like the work of Dan Kavanagh, you might want to try that of Booker Prize-winning author Julian Barnes. Well, why not?

In The Merry Merrick Month Of May

Disappointingly, at least in terms of the veracity of this post’s headline, Ken Bruen’s latest novel, MERRICK, arrives on April 15th rather than any time in May. Otherwise, it’s all good – it is, after all, a new novel from Ken Bruen. Quoth the blurb elves:

A new character and a new novel from one of the most prominent Irish crime writers of the last two decades. For fans of Ken Bruen’s Jack Taylor and Inspector Brant series, LA CONFIDENTIAL by James Ellroy and MYSTIC RIVER by Dennis Lehane, comes a noir crime story set in New York City about a rogue ex-cop from the Irish Gardai. A rouge Irish cop manipulates a transfer to work for the NYPD in an exchange program. However, it turns out that the Irish cop is really a serial killer wanted for murder in Ireland and now NYC.

  For all the details, clickety-click here …

Interview: Glenn Patterson

I had an interview with Glenn Patterson published in the Irish Examiner last week. It began a lot like this:

Born in Belfast in 1961, Glenn Patterson grew up through the Troubles, when virtually everything anyone ever heard about Northern Ireland was violence, bombs and sectarian strife. His latest novel, THE REST JUST FOLLOWS (Faber), begins in the early 1970s and spans almost four decades, but for an author who says he writes ‘in the spaces in-between’, it is by no means a ‘Troubles novel’.
  “What I really wanted to do with this book was to take a group of people and follow them from their pre-teens through to their early middle-age,” says Glenn when we sit down in Dublin’s Brooks Hotel. “They were going to have to live through a whole load of other stuff that I’d lived through, but also that the whole city of Belfast went through as well. Some of that has to do with the economy, some of it has to do with the politics and the Troubles – but it’s all just the stuff of the world that they all have to live through and deal with.”
  While the Troubles serves as a muted backdrop to the story, it’s much more a celebratory tale of how three teenagers – Maxine, Craig and St. John – grow up making the same kinds of mistakes and experiencing the same kinds of joy as kids in cities all over the world. Glenn mentions David Holmes, the Belfast-born DJ, whom he interviewed for a TV documentary a couple of years ago.
  “We were talking about growing up in Belfast – for him it would have been the 1980s and into the ’90s, when he was starting to DJ in Belfast. And he said that he was really happy that his children didn’t have to grow up in what he grew up in. But then he paused and he said, ‘But I’m really glad that I did.’ I think it’s very hard to regret your own teenage years. So much of who we are has to do with what happened to us at that age that it doesn’t really matter what was going on in the public domain. That’s your only chance to be that age.”

  For the rest, clickety-click here …

Boy, Interrupted

Karen Perry’s THE BOY THAT NEVER WAS (Penguin / Michael Joseph) is an intriguing prospect, being the debut crime thriller from a writing team composed of Karen Gillece and Paul Perry. Karen is the author of several literary novels, including SEVEN NIGHTS IN ZARAGOZA and LONGSHORE DRIFT, while Paul is not only a critically acclaimed author, but a lecturer in Creative Writing for Kingston University, London, Writer Fellow for University College Dublin, and Course Director in Poetry for the Faber Academy in Dublin. Quoth the blurb elves:

You were loved and lost – then you came back …
  Five years ago, three-year-old Dillon disappeared. For his father Harry – who left him alone for ten crucial minutes – it was an unforgivable lapse. Yet Dillon’s mother Robyn has never blamed her husband: her own secret guilt is burden enough.
  Now they’re trying to move on, returning home to Dublin to make a fresh start.
  But their lives are turned upside down the day Harry sees an eight-year-old boy in the crowd. A boy Harry is convinced is Dillon. But the boy vanishes before he can do anything about it.
  What Harry thought he saw quickly plunges their marriage into a spiral of crazed obsession and broken trust, uncovering deceits and shameful secrets. Everything Robyn and Harry ever believed in one another is cast into doubt.
  And at the centre of it all is the boy that never was …

  THE BOY THAT NEVER WAS arrives with impressive advance praise from Tana French, Jeffrey Deaver, John Boyne and Nelson DeMille. For all the details, clickety-click here …

The Rosary Garden In The Gutter

I mentioned Nicola White’s debut IN THE ROSARY GARDEN (Cargo Publishing) a couple of weeks ago, a novel that comes to us with impressive advance praise from Declan Hughes, Denise Mina and Val McDermid.
  Set in Ireland in 1984, the novel opens with the discovery of a dead infant on the grounds of a convent. Complicating the tragedy is the fact that this is not the first time the schoolgirl who finds the body has unearthed a dead baby …
  As part of her UK and Ireland tour, Nicola White launches IN THE ROSARY GARDEN on Tuesday 25th March at The Gutter Bookshop in Cow’s Lane, Temple Bar at 6.30pm.
  For all the details, clickety-click here …

CRIME ALWAYS PAYS: The Countdown Begins …

It’s hard to believe it’s that time again, but my latest tome, CRIME ALWAYS PAYS (Severn House), is published next week, on March 27th. It feels kind of strange right now, because there’s a sense of being in limbo, of not knowing how it’s likely to be received. Meanwhile, as you might imagine, I’m cracking on with the new book, and just today hit the halfway point – although ‘cracking on’ might be a bit misleading, as there are very many days when ‘trudging waist-deep in treacle’ might be more apt.
  Anyway, the blurb for CAP runs as follows:

Karen and Ray are on their way to the Greek islands to rendezvous with Madge and split the fat bag of cash they conned from Karen’s ex, Rossi, when they kidnapped, well, Madge. But they’ve reckoned without Doyle, the cop who can’t decide if she wants to arrest Madge, shoot Rossi, or ride off into the sunset with Ray …

  If you’re in the mood for a short taster, Chapter 1 can be found here.
  If that piques your interest, and you’d like a review copy of CRIME ALWAYS PAYS, there are digital copies available via NetGalley. If you have any problems downloading it, just drop me a line and I’ll do my luddite best to help.
  Here endeth the shilling … for now.

Cometh The Winter, Cometh The Wolf

The launch for John Connolly’s latest Charlie Parker novel, THE WOLF IN WINTER (Hodder & Stoughton) takes place in Dublin’s Smock Alley tomorrow evening, March 20th:

We are delighted to announce another event our ongoing series of author talks with our neighbours, the Gutter Bookshop. Join us to celebrate the launch of the twelfth Charlie Parker thriller, THE WOLF IN WINTER. John Connolly will be joined by musicians Jonny Kearney and Lucy Farrell in what promises to be a unique and thrilling evening.

  As I understand it, the Smock Alley venue is entirely booked out, but John also plans a book signing after the event at ye olde Gutter Bookshop. For all the details, clickety-click here …

“Ya Wanna Do It Here Or Down The Station, Punk?” DA Mishani

Yep, it’s rubber-hose time, folks: a rapid-fire Q&A for those shifty-looking usual suspects ...

What crime novel would you most like to have written?
Probably ROSEANNA, by Swedish authors Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo (1965), the first Martin Beck novel. It taught crime writers that pacey can also be slow and its bitter melancholy is intertwined with the funniest scenes ever written in a crime novel (especially those with American detective Kafka).

What fictional character would you most like to have been?
Any character living permanently in Paris. And since I wouldn’t mind being a real detective, at least for a while, why not Jules Maigret? He’s eating very well, drinking very well, smoking good tobacco, involved in the most interesting cases and still seems so relaxed.

Who do you read for guilty pleasures?
The Classics. Mainly Flaubert or Balzac. Now, for example, I’m reading a beautiful novel by Stefan Zweig and feeling very guilty I’m not reading crime.

Most satisfying writing moment?
Honestly? Writing the words ‘The End’. But also when a character surprises and sometimes even saves you. It happened to me while writing THE MISSING FILE: I thought the novel would end in a very sad way but then a female character I like a lot, Marianka, saved me and offered a new solution that I added to the novel.

If you could recommend one Irish crime novel, what would it be?
Since not many crime novels are translated to Hebrew I'm afraid I don’t know enough Irish crime novels – but I enjoyed immensely Benjamin Black’s CHRISTINE FALLS and THE SILVER SWAN. Obviously Black\Banville is an exceptional writer and I can’t wait to read his THE BLACK-EYED BLONDE.

Worst / best thing about being a writer?
The best thing about being a writer is the fact that everything you do counts as ‘work’. I can watch a crime series on television or read or even just walk for hours and listen to music and still tell myself and others I’m working, and even hard, and that might even be true because who knows, maybe at these exact moments writing is happening inside. The worst thing is that sometimes, no matter what you do and how much you try, writing stays inside and just doesn’t happen elsewhere and then you really feel like you’re doing nothing, staring at your computer screen for hours, while you could (and should) have done something else, real work for instance.

The pitch for your next book is …?
An explosive device is found in a suitcase near a daycare centre in a quiet suburb of Tel Aviv. A few hours later, a threat is received: the suitcase was only the beginning. Tormented by the trauma and failure of his past case, Inspector Avraham Avraham is determined not to make the same mistakes—especially with innocent lives at stake. He may have a break when one of the suspects, a father of two, appears to have gone on the run. Is he the terrorist behind the threat? Or perhaps he’s fleeing a far more terrible crime that no one knows has been committed? (The novel’s name is A POSSIBILITY OF VIOLENCE and it’ll be published in English in July 2014).

Who are you reading right now?
I just finished Ian McEwan’s SWEET TOOTH (what an ending!) after discovering Juan Gabriel Vasquez’ excellent THE SOUND OF THINGS FALLING.

God appears and says you can only write OR read. Which would it be?
I can see my Ego jumping ahead and screaming ‘Write’! But that would have been a very miserable choice. Reading is much more important to my mental health.

THE MISSING FILE by DA Mishani is published by Quercus.

The St. Patrick’s Day Massacre

Given that it’s the St. Patrick’s Day weekend, I thought I’d run a quick round-up of some interesting Irish crime fiction novels, aka ‘Emerald Noir’, that have appeared on ye olde blogge so far in 2014. It runs a lot like this:

THE BLACK-EYED BLONDE by Benjamin Black, aka the new Philip Marlowe novel.

UNRAVELLING OLIVER by Liz Nugent, an intriguing debut from an impressive new voice.

SLEEPING DOGS by Mark O’Sullivan, a sequel to one of the more interesting debuts I read last year.

THE RAGE by Gene Kerrigan, which was recently shortlisted in the LA Times’ Book Awards crime / mystery category.

BLUE IS THE NIGHT by Eoin McNamee, a superb novel which concludes his ‘Blue’ trilogy.

IN THE ROSARY GARDEN by Nicola White, another excellent debut.

HARM’S REACH by Alex Barclay, the latest in the Ren Bryce series, which I’ve been enjoying hugely.

THE FINAL SILENCE by Stuart Neville, the third novel to feature DI Jack Lennon.

KILMOON by Lisa Alber, a debut written by an American author and set in Ireland.

DEADLY INTENT by Anna Sweeney, which is to the best of my knowledge the first Irish crime novel translated from the Irish language.

THE WOLF IN WINTER by John Connolly, which is the latest Charlie Parker novel, and hotly anticipated it is too.

IN THE MORNING I’LL BE GONE by Adrian McKinty, which concludes his excellent Sean Duffy trilogy.

CAN ANYONE HELP ME? by Sinead Crowley, a forthcoming debut already attracting plenty of strong advance buzz.

  So there you have it – just some of the highlights from the last couple of months on Crime Always Pays. If you’re looking for another author, just type in the name in the search engine on the top left of the page, and off you go. Oh, and a very happy St. Patrick’s day to you, wherever you may be in the world …

A Trilogy Grows Up In Brooklyn

Irish-American author Eamon Loingsigh has just published LIGHT OF THE DIDDICOY (Three Rooms Press), the first in a planned trilogy backdropped by the immigrant Irish gang experience on the Brooklyn waterfront. To wit:

LIGHT OF THE DIDDICOY is the riveting and immersive saga of Irish gangs on the Brooklyn waterfront in the early part of the 20th century, told through the eyes of young newcomer Liam Garrity. Forced at age 14 to travel alone to America after money grew scarce in Ireland, Garrity stumbles directly into the hard-knock streets of the Irish-run waterfront and falls in with a Bridge District gang called the White Hand. Through a series of increasingly tense and brutal scenes, he has no choice but to use any means necessary to survive and carve out his place in a no-holds-barred community living outside the law. The book is the first of Irish-American author Eamon Loingsigh’s ‘Auld Irishtown’ trilogy, which delves into the stories and lore of the gangs and families growing up in this under-documented area of Brooklyn’s Irish underworld.

  For all the details, clickety-click here …

Norn Iron, Norn Noir

I mentioned a couple of months ago that Adrian McKinty and Stuart Neville are co-editing a collection of short stories titled BELFAST NOIR (Akashic City Noir), and the first sight of the cover has popped up over at Adrian McKinty’s interweb lair. Quoth Adrian:

“With the success of the new BBC drama ‘The Fall’ and the bestseller status of a surprising number of crime writers from Ireland, I think the wheel may finally turning towards Northern Irish fiction. For years the words “The Troubles”, “Northern Ireland” and “Belfast” caused book buyers, programme makers and publishers to either shrug with indifference or shudder in horror; but the new generation of writers coming out of Belfast is so good that a previously reluctant audience has had their interest piqued. I’ve been saying on this blog for the last three years that the Scandinavian crime boom is going to end and the Irish crime boom is going to begin and I still believe that. The depth of talent is there. All it needs is a spark, hopefully BELFAST NOIR will add kindling to a growing fire ...”

  For all the details, clickety-click here …

Blonde Ambition

I had a piece published in the Irish Independent last weekend on the new Benjamin Black Philip Marlowe novel, THE BLACK-EYED BLONDE (Mantle), which was very enjoyable to write, not least because the commission required me to write a goodly chunk about Raymond Chandler and Philip Marlowe before getting down to the nitty-gritty of the Benjamin Black novel. I liked the book a lot, by the way, even it’s not a purist’s dream of Chandleresque prose. That piece can be found here.
  Meanwhile, John Banville had a very good piece in The Guardian last weekend about his long-standing love affair with the novels of Raymond Chandler, which began at a young age. Here’s a sample:

“The most durable thing in writing is style,” Chandler wrote in a letter to a literary agent in 1945. In this assertion and others like it he was laying claim to his place on Parnassus, if on one of the lower slopes. Flaubert and Joyce complained frequently and loudly of having no choice but to scatter the gold coinage of their prose over the base metal of mere mortal doings, and Chandler too, in his less emphatic, more sardonic, way, sought to set himself among the gods of pure language, pure style.
  Like the bard of Bay City, the French and Irish masters of realist fiction frequently professed to care nothing for content and everything for form – and form, of course, was just another word for style. Writing to one of his numerous correspondents, Chandler insisted that “the only writers left who have anything to say are those who write about practically nothing and monkey around with odd ways of doing it”. Out of their grand indifference, however, Flaubert created Emma Bovary and Frédéric Moreau, and Joyce Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus; and Chandler, not to be outdone, gave us Marlowe, the private eye of private eyes, who is among the immortals. – John Banville

  For the rest, clickety-click here …

This Way Comes ...

Reid All About It

Moss Reid is the private eye hero of Mel Healy’s debut novel, ANOTHER CASE IN COWTOWN (Createspace), which is set in Dublin’s Stoneybatter. To wit:

Dublin, Ireland, summer 2013. It’s the middle of a heatwave, and things are hotting up for Moss Reid. He’s the kind of downscale private eye who likes to have the right priorities in life: eat, drink and investigate - in that order. But the Stoneybatter sleuth has way too much on his plate this week: an adoption trace, a missing person, a couple of cheating spouses, a series of thefts at a top Dublin restaurant, and someone has nicked his laptop. So what’s he doing sitting in an interrogation room, being grilled (and boiled and finely diced) by the Murder Squad? ANOTHER CASE IN COWTOWN is the first in Irish writer Mel Healy’s series about Moss Reid, the gastronomic detective whose main patch is Dublin’s urban village of Stoneybatter.

  For all the details, clickety-click here …

Hardboiled Cool

I came across a very nice round-up of ‘hardboiled Irish crime fiction’ over at Off the Shelf the other day, which – I was very pleased to discover – included my very own ABSOLUTE ZERO COOL. To wit:

A fictional version of writer Burke is confronted by a character from an unfinished novel. Karlsson, the now-corporeal character, is irked at the limbo he has been left in. Burke is under pressure from his publisher to submit his next manuscript, but Karlsson is alternately charming and cheeky, and Burke agrees to let him write his own story. This gripping tale subverts the crime genre’s grand tradition of liberal sadism. Not only an example of Irish crime writing at its best; it is an innovative, self-reflexive piece that turns every convention of crime fiction on its head.

  The piece also includes novels by Gene Kerrigan, Tana French, Alan Glynn, Adrian McKinty, Ken Bruen, Stuart Neville and Declan Hughes. For all the details, clickety-click here …

Review: THE GODS OF GUILT by Michael Connelly

Michael Connelly began writing the Mickey Haller novels in a bid to recharge his batteries for his long-running series hero, the LAPD detective Harry Bosch, who has featured in 16 novels since he first appeared in The Black Echo (1992). The Gods of Guilt is only the fifth story to feature defence lawyer Mickey Haller, but the success of the movie of The Lincoln Lawyer – released in 2011, starring Matthew McConaughey and based on the novel of the same name from 2005 – means that Mickey Haller is now arguably a more popular character than Bosch.
  That popularity is reflected in an early flash of deadpan humour, as Haller rushes down the courthouse steps and sits into the back seat of the Lincoln town car from which he conducts his business, only to discover that he’s sitting in another lawyer’s Lincoln.
  In the cutthroat world of LA’s legal system, where lawyers compete fiercely for business, the admittedly flattering imitation is costing Mickey dearly. Mickey, however, has more pressing concerns. An old friend, Gloria Dayton, has been found murdered. Complicating matters is the fact that the alleged killer, Gloria’s pimp, has requested that Mickey defend him in court, and has done so on Gloria’s advice.
  Taking the case against his better judgement, Mickey has good reason to rue his decision when it gradually becomes apparent that the murder is rooted in a previous case. Soon Mickey is battling on a number of fronts, and finds himself and his associates targeted by a Mexican drugs cartel.
  The title of The Gods of Guilt refers to the jurors who deliver their verdict on the men and women Mickey Haller defends in court, but there’s a personal dimension to it too. “The gods of guilt are many,” says Legal Siegel, Mickey’s aging mentor. “You don’t need to add to them.” Mickey Haller is a slick, fast-talking defence lawyer who isn’t above bending the rules to ensure clients walk away from court with a not-guilty verdict, regardless of their innocence, but his professional exterior masks a man haunted by demons.
  That clash of the professional and the personal manifests itself in the fraught relationship with his teenage daughter, Hayley, who holds her father responsible for a tragedy in her own life. Her refusal to speak with him and Mickey’s increasingly desperate attempts to open a line of communication offer a poignant counterpoint to Mickey’s hardboiled persona, and effectively humanises the kind of character that is too often characterised as a shallow, sleazy shyster.
  A Pulitzer Prize finalist when he worked as a crime reporter, Connelly tells his story in the taut, driven, journalistic style that has become his trademark as an author over the course of two decades and 26 novels. The result is a propulsive, intricately plotted and emotionally involving tale, but The Gods of Guilt also marks the emergence of Mickey Haller from the long shadow cast by Harry Bosch to become a complex and fascinating character in his own right. ~ Declan Burke

  This review first appeared in the Irish Times.

Review: UNRAVELLING OLIVER by Liz Nugent

The latest crime fiction column in the Irish Times was published last weekend, featuring offerings from George Pelecanos, Laura Wilson, DA Mishani and Margie Orford. It also included UNRAVELLING OLIVER, the debut novel from Irish author Liz Nugent. To wit:

Liz Nugent’s Unravelling Oliver (Penguin Ireland, €14.99) opens with Dublin-based writer Oliver Ryan viciously beating his wife Alice. The assault is described in the first person by Oliver himself, but Oliver’s is only one of a number of first-person accounts on offer here, each one a piece of the jigsaw that gradually assembles itself into portrait of a pathetic young boy who grew up to become a monster who writes best-selling children’s books. The reader is given no framing device relating to who might have collated the various accounts, or why, but the narrative gambit pays off handsomely. Oliver Ryan may be a vain, shallow and ultimately violent sociopath, but his story grows more compelling and nuanced the more we learn about him and the factors that influenced the man he would become, some of which were set in train even before he was born. More an investigation into psychology than a conventional crime thriller, Unravelling Oliver is a formidable debut. ~ Declan Burke

  For the rest, clickety-click here …

“Ya Wanna Do It Here Or Down The Station, Punk?” Pat Fitzpatrick

Yep, it’s rubber-hose time, folks: a rapid-fire Q&A for those shifty-looking usual suspects ...

What crime novel would you most like to have written?
Anything by Ed McBain. I picked up one his books in a second-hand book shop in New York because it was a dollar and I liked the cover. Before that I had no interest in crime novels; after that I had little interest in anything else. So McBain is my first love.

What fictional character would you most like to have been?
Philip Kerr’s brilliant creation, Bernie Gunther.

Who do you read for guilty pleasures?
I’d have to plead guilty to John Grisham. But he probably knows a lawyer who can get me off.

Most satisfying writing moment?
The first sentence. It tends to get tricky after that.

If you could recommend one Irish crime novel, what would it be?
THE BOOK OF EVIDENCE. I’m not sure if John Banville meant to it to be read as a crime novel. But that’s how I see it.

What Irish crime novel would make a great movie?
I think THE BOOK OF EVIDENCE would make for a great movie.

Worst / best thing about being a writer?
The worst is the feeling that everything you write could do with a bit of improvement. The best is when someone reads something you wrote and says otherwise.

The pitch for your next book is …?
The pitch is under wraps at the moment because it is a sequel to my current book and I don’t want to give too much away. But here’s a little taster for now:

He didn’t cry out when Fanta McCarthy hammered the long slender nails into his palms. But he knew it was only a matter of time before he told them everything. And then the killing could begin.

Who are you reading right now?
Would you believe EIGHTBALL BOOGIE by a certain Declan Burke? I know that seems like I’m sucking up to my interrogator, but it happens to be true.

God appears and says you can only write OR read. Which would it be?
I’d go looking for a new God, one who isn’t so cruel.

The three best words to describe your own writing are …?
Short, Sharp and Entertaining (I hope.)

KEEP AWAY FROM THOSE FERRARIS is Pat Fitzpatrick’s debut novel.

Gather Ye Rosaries While Ye May

Nicola White’s debut novel, IN THE ROSARY GARDEN (Cargo Publishing) won the 2013 £10,000 Dundee International Book Prize, and comes adorned with praise from Val McDermid, AL Kennedy and Denise Mina. To wit:

Ali Hogan is leaving school, all the possibilities of adult life glistening before her, when her discovery of a murdered newborn in the convent garden in Ireland shatters her world and resurrects half-formed memories of her childhood. For detective Vincent Swan, this baby’s resting place in the grounds of a prosperous school, in an Ireland riven by battles of religion and reproduction, makes the case a media sensation even as the church moves to suppress it. Swan is no friend of the Catholic church; Swan doesn’t have many friends. Even his own wife is a mystery to him. Ali flees the media spotlight, seeking refuge at her uncle’s farm in remote Buleen where she starts to put together the fragments of an older tragedy, another child’s death. Meanwhile in Dublin, Swan’s investigation is stalling, forcing him to consider that the scraps of evidence point to Ali Hogan herself ...

  For all the details, clickety-click here …

Third Colour: Blue

There was a very nice review by Martin Doyle of Eoin McNamee’s BLUE IS THE NIGHT (Faber) in the Irish Times on Saturday, which opened thusly:

In the traditional murder mystery, death shatters society’s settled calm, then the killer is caught and punished and normality is restored. But what if society is not normal, if in “a Protestant State for a Protestant people” the killer is a Protestant and his victim a Catholic? Will justice sneak a peek from beneath its blindfold and, with a weather eye on the mob, fix the scales to avert a riot and let justice go hang?
  Who will guard the guards, asked Juvenal? Who will judge the judges? Eoin McNamee, damningly, does so here. He has previous. McNamee made his name as an author of psychologically penetrating and stylised literary reimaginings of real-life crimes, a murky world of subterfuge and sabotage, conspiracy and camouflage, from the Shankill Butchers ( Resurrection Man ) to the murderous activities and murder of the undercover British intelligence officer Robert Nairac ( The Ultras ) to the death of Diana, princess of Wales ( 12.23 ).
  Blue Is the Night is the third in a loose trilogy based on notorious murders in the North, which begins with the darkly compelling Blue Tango, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2001. Its subject was the murder in 1952 of Judge Lance Curran’s 19-year-old daughter Patricia, the wrongful conviction of Iain Hay Gordon for the crime and the suspicious behaviour of her family.

  For the rest, clickety-click here …

A Guilty Pleasure

Sean McGrady’s THE BASTARD PLEASURE (Dzanc Books) didn’t come across my radar when it was published last year, and I doubt very much if it was written as a crime novel, but it does sound like yet another fascinating addition to the body of fiction emerging from Northern Ireland. To wit:

THE BASTARD PLEASURE is a dark novel. It concerns itself with the mystery of identity and individuation, its destruction and the brutal way in which it is reclaimed in an emerging act of intuitive will and self-affirmation, that is both obligated and free, in the circumstances, to be either good or evil – more plainly, it is about terrorism, in its concrete and seemingly incomprehensible forms, that eminently reveals existential ‘border situations’ in ambiguity and contradiction.

  And here’s a little more:

“McGrady’s pitch-black coming-of-age story picks up where his debut, THE BACKSLIDER, left off: Belfast, during the early 1970s; a time of fear and violence, but also, it would seem from this meticulously chronicled account, of precarious hope and occasional hilarity. For his narrator, seventeen year-old Seamus McGladdery, it is a time of self-discovery. What kind of man is he going to be, and on which side that of the ‘fly Provo boys’ who rule the streets, or that of his Protestant forebears-will he take a stand? ‘Black Belfast’ has seldom been more sharply realized, in taut, visceral prose whose Beckettian cadences are relieved by flashes of humour. Unflinching in its depiction of a deeply troubled era in Ireland’s history, THE BASTARD PLEASURE is no easy read, but it is a rewarding one, full of thought-provoking insights and incidental pleasures.” -- Christina Koning

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