Nobody Move, This Is A Review: WHO IS CONRAD HIRST? by Kevin Wignall

At first sight an unwieldy title, WHO IS CONRAD HIRST? becomes an ever more poignant question the deeper you delve into Kevin Wignall’s fourth novel. Wignall quickly and skilfully establishes what Hirst is: a contract killer and a very good one as a result of his dehumanising experiences as photographer-turned-mercenary in the former Yugoslavia. But the story opens in the aftermath of what should have been the routine killing of an old man who was once something of a minor power broker during the Cold War, with Hirst visiting his handler having already decided – for reasons that only become apparent much later in the story – that his exit strategy from the life he has lived for the last decade will be the relatively simple killing of the four men who have been benefiting from his perverse talents. It’s an intriguing set-up, but almost immediately Wignall tosses in a curve-ball: were he and Hirst to pursue that line, the story would become an uncovering of what Hirst is, not who he is. It’s this element, the philosophical self-questioning Hirst subjects himself to as he criss-crosses Europe pursued by various shadowy agencies, that lends the lie to the intriguing but misleading ‘Jason Bourne’ references on the cover. Even as Hirst ruthlessly eliminates those who stand in his way, and with a cold-blooded suddenness that can cause the book to jump in your hands, Wignall takes aim at the heart of the human condition, peeling back the layers of paranoia, suspicion and mistrust that characterise – if we’re fully honest – our relationship with our darkest selves until the messy, inconvenient truth of Hirst's true identity is finally laid bare. A hugely satisfying blend of tragic love story, adrenaline-charged thriller and philosophical tract, and one that (appropriately enough) raises as many questions as it answers, this novel is as subtly devastating as an assassin in the night. – Declan Burke

This review was first published on Euro Crime

This Week We’re Reading … Who Is Conrad Hirst? and The Bloomsday Dead

Kevin Wignall’s up-coming Who Is Conrad Hirst? (to be published on November 13) is being flagged as a Jason Bourne-style thriller, but while the eponymous anti-hero is a frighteningly proficient hitman, Wignall’s creation is a far more philosophical character – indeed, the whole point of the exercise is for Conrad to answer the question posed in the title. That’s not to say there isn’t plenty of action, because there is, but the page-turning pace is leavened by a more satisfying quality of self-analysis than is generally to be found in straightforward thrillers. Powerful stuff from the author of For The Dogs, and there’s a strong chance it’ll propel him into the big leagues. Meanwhile, The Bloomsday Dead concludes Adrian McKinty’s ‘Dead’ trilogy, with the indestructible Michael Forsythe back home in Ireland to conduct a search for the kidnapped daughter of flame-haired Bridget, Forsythe’s femme fatale nemesis from the trilogy’s opener, Dead I Well May Be. With the plot unfolding over the space of one day – June 16, aka Bloomsday, which honours the hero of James Joyce’s Ulysses – the pace is frantic from the get-go, charging along in an adrenaline frenzy as Michael takes on anyone from Peruvian hitmen to the IRA as he seeks closure on the life he has been forced to live for the last decade. As always with McKinty, the writing is of a superior quality, the graphically etched outbursts of violence shot through with a quirky poetry that mines a particularly dark seam of humour. The only disappointment? That this is touted as the final Forsythe novel. Say it ain’t so, Joe, sorry, Adrian …