The Cold Cold Ground

December 3, 2012
This series starter from McKinty (Fifty Grand) introduces hard-boiled but likable Det. Sgt. Sean Duffy, a Catholic who remains brashly, winningly sardonic even under the pressure of 1981 Belfast's overwhelmingly Protestant police force. With the hunger strikes ongoing, Duffy tries to prove himself by finding an apparent serial killer targeting gay men, but is impeded by Northern Ireland's revolution-racked but socially conservative culture. As Duffy tries to decipher gnomic clues involving opera and mythology, he begins to suspect that the suicide of a hunger striker's wife links the apparently apolitical murders to the equally ruthless paramilitary and IRA factions. Though an anachronistic tone occasionally jars with the period atmosphere provided by carefully observed detail and cameos from the likes of Gerry Adams, the deft mix of noirish melancholy with express-train pacing and blockbuster-ready action enticingly sets the stage for Duffy's future adventures.

Starred review from November 1, 2012

What better cover for a serial killer than the political hunger strikes, car bombs, and street riots of Northern Ireland's "troubles"? Det. Sean Duffy, a rarity as a Catholic cop, doesn't step back from digging deep into a case in which gay men are being killed and mutilated with symbolic messages (such as cut-off hands) and more obscure, artistic clues. But as Duffy learns more about the victims, he wonders if their deaths aren't politically motivated after all. Then, when a local missing woman turns up dead and is presumed to have killed herself, initially only Duffy senses that she was murdered and that her death connects with those of the gay men. By now, he has managed to alienate some powerful folks in the activist movement, and he might have to be silenced, too. VERDICT For fans of Stewart Neville's crime novels, a new and harrowing Irish trilogy is underway. At turns violent and labyrinthine, McKinty's (Dead I Well May Be) fine police procedural is also the ultimate page-turner. I cannot wait for Book Two!NEWLY TRANSLATED

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