The Irish Crime Fiction Supergroup

Guess which one is Colin Bateman

A repost from December of last year and a useful reminder that Irish crime fiction is at least as good as that coming from Scandinavia or anywhere else for that matter...
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For the last year or two here on my blog I've been trying to get people interested in my books in particular and in Irish crime writing in general. It's sometimes been an uphill struggle because, compared to Nordic or English crime fiction, Irish crime writers still seem to lurk in the periphery. This is strange to me because in terms of quality and diversity Irish crime fiction is booming. I wonder if Ireland has an image problem: years of insidious and dreary cliches in what I like to call Micksploitation films have conditioned the book buying public to demand fiction that conforms to their expectations. When people think of Ireland they still think of smoky pubs, flat caps and sheep; they want their Ireland to be the Ireland of the 1950's. Working in a New York Barnes and Noble I discovered that Irish Americans are not particularly avid readers and when they do buy books it's often something ghastly thing like How The Irish Saved Civilization or The Best Irish Castles. Therefore if you want to sell books with an Irish theme in America you have to reach beyond the Irish American community but there again you are often hit by the stereotypes and imagery of what it means to be Irish. When the average American punter buys an English or Nordic mystery novel they think they're getting something that not only will entertain them but will also improve them in some way because Swedes and Englishmen seem so darn intelligent. And this I feel appeals to something deep in the American psyche - the need to better oneself.   
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Irish fiction is intellectually on a par with any other literature in the world and I'd go further and say that Irish crime writing currently leads the world in diversity and richness. That such a small island can produce such a welter of talent is truly amazing. On his blog, Crime Always Pays, Declan Burke tirelessly promotes his fellow Micks and although I am not as well read as Declan, here are few authors that I have read in the last couple of years that I think you should be aware of...who knows it might even help with some last minute Christmas shopping. 
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*Declan Burke: Dec's novel Absolute Zero Cool may be his masterpiece. Channeling Flann O'Brien Dec has an original and utterly brilliant take on the contemporary crime novel. His latest Slaughter's Hound was one of the best Irish crime novels of the year.

*Stuart Neville: Stuart's first novel The Twelve was a work of brilliance. Incredibly his follow up books have only gotten better. Don't let the beard fool you, he's just a kid really, and he's got a long promising career ahead of him. I finished Ratlines last week and can vouch for it as an amazing book

*Eoin McNamee: Perhaps the most intelligent and thoughtful of this generation's crop of Irish novelists. At home in literary fiction and crime fiction, Eoin's book Orchid Blue is one of my all time favourites. 

*Ken Bruen: Sir Ken of Bruen is The Man as far as I'm concerned. The Irish Elmore Leonard or possibly the Irish Michael Connolly, but, you know, funnier. He's done many wonderful books since but there's a soft spot in my heart for Her Last Call To Louis MacNeice, one of his early classics.
*Ronan Bennett: This generation's Graham Greene. As comfortable in film and television as he is in fiction. Havoc In The Third Year is one of the great novels of our time and it should have won the Booker Prize. 

*Garbhan Downey: The bard of Derry. Garv hilariously unpacks the foibles and fantasies of the denizens of Ireland's most eccentric city. My favourite? War of the Blue Noses. 
*Kevin McCarthy: Only got to one Kevin McCarthy book so far but that was the fantastic novel Peeler. Definitely one of those books that you'll read compulsively in one long sitting. 

*Colin Bateman: Cursed by a childhood in Ireland's most boring town, Bangor, Bateman rose above the tedium of tea shops and ice cream parlours to become a best selling comic novelist. His done nothing but brilliant work since but I still love Divorcing Jack from a few years back. 

*David Park: A thoughtful, intelligent, subtle novelist in the Graham Green/Brian Moore mould. More of a literary guy than a crime guy really. His masterpiece, The Truth Commissioner, is the book to read if you want to understand what happened to Northern Ireland from 1968 - 1998. 

*Tana French: I was in a bookshop in Tokyo looking for something to read on the train and in among the Japanese novels was a shelf full of Ms French. I bought, I read, I loved. Now I've read them all and they're all great. 

*Ruth Dudley Edwards: A true prose master. Her crime novels are fantastic but for me her book about the Omagh bombing takes us to another level. A must read for anyone who is interested in contemporary Ireland. 

*Brian McGilloway: You all know Brian don't you? One of the brightest lights in all of Irish literature. Intelligent and tough with a poet's heart, he's a best seller in the UK and Ireland and he's increasingly huge in America. If you don't have a BMCG book go get one, now!

*John Connolly: How do you crack America? Well, if Alex Barclay and Stuart Neville are the Kinks and the Stones JC is the Beatles. You crack America by writing taut, original, stylish crime fiction with a supernatural bent.  

*Gene Kerrigan: I just finished Kerrigan's The Rage and I thought it was amazing. I'll definitely be reading more in the future.  

*Dec Hughes: The Wrong Kind of Blood is the first in the great Ed Loy mystery series. Hughes is street wise, smart, witty and just a little bit cocky. 

*Gerard Brennan: One of the new generation of N Irish novelists and playwrights. This year I read Brennan's hilarious, tight, brilliant novella The Point. I was lucky enough to get The Wee Rockets in manuscript and I knew it was going to be a hit. It was. 

*Alan Glynn: Winterland is one of my favourite books of the last five years. I haven't read Glynn's latest but I surely will. 
*Cormac Millar: Only read one CM book, The Grounds, but fortunately it was a fantastic read. Definitely adding more to my TBR pile. 
*Arlene Hunt: Also only read one Arlene Hunt novel but luckily that was also pretty damn fine. It was called The Chosen and it was one of my books of the year.
*Alex Barclay: I really enjoyed Barclay's Darkhouse, one of my favourite books of 2010.
*John McFetridge: John is from Montreal but his ancestors are from Larne (God help them!) His novel Tumblin Dice was recently picked by Amazon.ca as one of the best Canadian crime novels of the year. (THE best if you ask me).
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Like I say, this list is not exhaustive. I'm not as well read as many people in this field, but if I've piqued your curiosity at all investigate the authors above and please check out Crime Always Pays and Detectives Beyond Borders for a more comprehensive look at Irish crime fiction.

The Cold Cold Ground

COLD COLD GROUND is a beautiful, thrilling heartbreaker of a book, alive with the sorrow and poetry of Ireland.  Adrian McKinty is one of the finest writers working in any genre. ---Tim Hallinan

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It's undoubtedly McKinty's finest novel: a visceral journey to the heart of darkness that was 1980's Northern Ireland. Written with intelligence, insight and wit, McKinty exposes the cancer of corruption at all levels of society at that time. Sean Duffy is a compelling detective, the evocation of the period is breathtaking and the atmosphere authentically menacing. A brilliant piece of work which does for the North what Peace's Red Riding Quartet did for Yorkshire.---Brian McGilloway
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THE COLD, COLD GROUND is a razor sharp thriller set against the backdrop of a country in chaos, told with style, courage and dark-as-night wit.  Adrian McKinty channels Dennis Lehane, David Peace and Joseph Wambaugh to create a brilliant novel with its own unique voice.---Stuart Neville
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The Cold Cold Ground is a fearless trip into the nightmare world of Northern Ireland in the 1980’s:  riots, hunger strikes, murders -- a time when every action from the mundane to the extreme is a political statement, yet Adrian McKinty tells a very personal story of an ordinary cop trying to hunt down a killer.---John McFetridge
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Adrian McKinty's The Cold Cold Ground has got to on my five best of the year [list] as it is riveting, brilliant and just about the best book yet on Northern Ireland.---Ken Bruen
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Adrian McKinty is the voice of the new Northern Irish generation but he’s not afraid to examine the past. Through Sean Duffy, his latest protagonist, he applies his unique writing skills to our troubled history expertly. This writer is a legend in the making and Cold, Cold Ground is the latest proof of this.---Gerard Brennan
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The sense of what it must have been like to live through the most explosive days of Northern Ireland’s Troubles is vivid but, more than that, convincing. This goes especially for the book's homely details and the off-hand observations by McKinty's Sean Duffy, a Catholic member of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. If McKinty were a tour guide, he’d take visitors to parts of Belfast and its surroundings that no one else does. The world’s most exciting crime fiction these days comes from Ireland, the best of that comes from the North, and The Cold Cold Ground may be the best crime novel – and one of the best books, period – out of Northern Ireland.–-- Peter Rozovsky

George McFly Day!

In an early Christmas pressie for me my author's copies of The Cold Cold Ground arrived today! The book looks fabulous and I'm really pleased with it. (The kids incidentally are dressed up for their school Matsuri Day.)
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Is The Cold Cold Ground any good? Well, I'm not a terrific judge of my own stuff but here are a few words from people that I admire in the crime fiction family:

COLD COLD GROUND is a beautiful, thrilling heartbreaker of a book, alive with the sorrow and poetry of Ireland.  Adrian McKinty is one of the finest writers working in any genre. 

---Tim Hallinan


It's undoubtedly McKinty's finest novel: a visceral journey to the heart of darkness that was 1980's Northern Ireland. Written with intelligence, insight and wit, McKinty exposes the cancer of corruption at all levels of society at that time. Sean Duffy is a compelling detective, the evocation of the period is breathtaking and the atmosphere authentically menacing. A brilliant piece of work which does for the North what Peace's Red Riding Quartet did for Yorkshire.

---Brian McGilloway


THE COLD, COLD GROUND is a razor sharp thriller set against the backdrop of a country in chaos, told with style, courage and dark-as-night wit.  Adrian McKinty channels Dennis Lehane, David Peace and Joseph Wambaugh to create a brilliant novel with its own unique voice.

---Stuart Neville

The Cold Cold Ground is a fearless trip into the nightmare world of Northern Ireland in the 1980’s:  riots, hunger strikes, murders -- a time when every action from the mundane to the extreme is a political statement, yet Adrian McKinty tells a very personal story of an ordinary cop trying to hunt down a killer.

---John McFetridge

Adrian McKinty's The Cold Cold Ground has got to on my five best of the year [list] as it is riveting, brilliant and just about the best book yet on Northern Ireland.

---Ken Bruen

Adrian McKinty is the voice of the new Northern Irish generation but he’s not afraid to examine the past. Through Sean Duffy, his latest protagonist, he applies his unique writing skills to our troubled history expertly. This writer is a legend in the making and Cold, Cold Ground is the latest proof of this.

---Gerard Brennan

The sense of what it must have been like to live through the most explosive days of Northern Ireland’s Troubles is vivid but, more than that, convincing. This goes especially for the book's homely details and the off-hand observations by McKinty's Sean Duffy, a Catholic member of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. If McKinty were a tour guide, he’d take visitors to parts of Belfast and its surroundings that no one else does. The world’s most exciting crime fiction these days comes from Ireland, the best of that comes from the North, and The Cold Cold Ground may be the best crime novel – and one of the best books, period – out of Northern Ireland.

–-- Peter Rozovsky

Let's Set Fire To Tears: Early Word On The Cold Cold Ground

Coming in January 2012...Hey, do me a big favour, tell a friend about this book. And then tell two more friends...

It's undoubtedly McKinty's finest novel: a visceral journey to the heart of darkness that was 1980's Northern Ireland. Written with intelligence, insight and wit, McKinty exposes the cancer of corruption at all levels of society at that time. Sean Duffy is a compelling detective, the evocation of the period is breathtaking and the atmosphere authentically menacing. A brilliant piece of work which does for the North what Peace's Red Riding Quartet did for Yorkshire.

---Brian McGilloway

THE COLD, COLD GROUND is a razor sharp thriller set against the backdrop of a country in chaos, told with style, courage and dark-as-night wit.  Adrian McKinty channels Dennis Lehane, David Peace and Joseph Wambaugh to create a brilliant novel with its own unique voice.

---Stuart Neville

The hunger strikes mark the bleakest period of Northern Ireland’s ‘Troubles’, and it’s entirely fitting that Adrian McKinty should be the writer to plunge into that darkest of hearts. It’s a rare author who can write so beautifully about such a poisonous atmosphere, but McKinty’s prose is a master-class in vicious poise as he explores the apparent contradictions that underpin Ulster’s self-loathing. Be in no doubt that this novel is a masterpiece: had David Peace, Eoin McNamee and Brian Moore sat down to brew up the great ‘Troubles’ novel, they would have been very pleased indeed to have written The Cold, Cold Ground.

---Declan Burke

The Cold Cold Ground is a fearless trip into Northern Ireland in the 1980’s:  riots, hunger strikes, murders -- a time when every action from the mundane to the extreme is a political statement, yet Adrian McKinty tells a very personal story of an ordinary cop trying to hunt down a serial killer.

---John McFetridge

Adrian McKinty's The Cold Cold Ground has got to on my five best of the year [list] as it is riveting, brilliant and just about the best book yet on Northern Ireland.

---Ken Bruen

Adrian McKinty is the voice of the new Northern Irish generation but he’s not afraid to examine the past. Through Sean Duffy, his latest protagonist, he applies his unique writing skills to our troubled history expertly. This writer is a legend in the making and Cold, Cold Ground is the latest proof of this.

---Gerard Brennan

Falling Glass Review & Interview

There's a very well thought out review of Falling Glass over at The Crime Of It All, here. It's the longest review of the book I've seen and it really gets beneath the surface of what I was attempting to do with the novel. It's a nice piece of writing too from Cormac O'Siochain. It's interesting to me that the critical consensus on Falling Glass has been so positive, from newspaper critics, blog critics and other professional reviewers; it's actually turned out to be my best reviewed book since Dead I Well May Be. It's also got some great reviews on Amazon, Amazon.co.uk and it got a Best Of The Year nod and some very sweet comments on Audible.com. And yet? Well, the big yet is that I can't find a US publisher for the novel. No one's interested. The major presses have turned me down and the small presses too. Is the story too Irish? Too contemporary? I don't know. John Banville was smart to set his crime novels in 1950's Dublin. I guess that's the Ireland Americans are comfortable reading about: the Ireland of horses and carts, smoky pubs, priests, Angela's Ashes and The Quiet Man. . . Them's the breaks I suppose, but for those of you awaiting the US release of Falling Glass, please don't hold your breath. 
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The Crime Of It All is also running an interview I did with Len Wanner last year. There you'll find my thoughts on Ken Bruen, Dostoyevsky and the title of the one book I think everyone should read. In a remarkable proof of my lack of prescience I also lambast the Irish Times for always reviewing my books badly, I talk about Ireland's economic "boom" (Ha!) and I misspell the word "recuse". 

10 Novels For Men

Men don’t buy novels anymore. They’ve pretty much stopped buying magazines and they don’t go to the cinema in as big numbers as they used to. What do they do? The answer is that nobody knows. Advertisers don’t know. TV programmers don’t know. Publishers certainly don’t know. Probably they’re playing Halo online, watching Louis CK videos on YouTube and googling for free pornography, but we can’t be certain.

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In my local Borders they have a "Guy Lit." section which contains thrillers by ex SAS men, alternative histories where the Nazis win the war and Nick Hornby novels...Is there a middle ground between the SS jackboot and the lime green Converse high top? Yes, I think so. Here’s my list of 10 novels for men who don’t normally like to read novels. Each one has the advantage of giving you a passport into a genre or an author that will keep you going for a while.


10. The Big Sleep - Raymond Chandler. It’s raining in Bay City (Santa Monica) and the slick streets are thick with ironic private eyes - the most poetic and interesting of them is a guy called Philip Marlowe.
9. Use of Weapons - Iain Banks. A crazy, violent space opera set in Banks’s Culture universe. A dude called Zakalwe is a major league bad ass with a power suit and a big gun. Havoc ensues pretty much all the time. At one point he gets his head chopped off by a bunch of insane cannibals. He survives.
8. In Dubious Battle - John Steinbeck. Commie agents in 30's California get the living shite knocked out of them as they lay the groundwork for revolution. This is a book to make Glenn Beck keek his whips and cry into his pillow. Nobody reads this anymore. Shame because its awesome.
8. A Farewell To Arms - Ernest Hemingway. A romantic (but in a manly Hemingwayesque way) American ambulance driver falls in love with war and then a nurse. He falls out of love with the former when he quickly sees how bloody horrible WWI actually is. All the way through you're thinking, this isn't going to end well...Unlike For Whom The Bell Tolls no one gets called "my little rabbit".
7. The Code of the Woosters - PG Wodehouse. Zen master Jeeves keeps his upper lip intact even in the most trying of circumstances. You think Snoop Dogg’s laid back? Jeeves would out limbo that mother any day of the week were he so vulgar as to engage in any kind of stick based contest.
6. The Ipcress File - Len Deighton. Harry Palmer is a spy, a gourmand, he counts his coppers, lives in a flat, flies to America and watches an H bomb test (they couldnt afford to put that bit in the movie).
5. The Cold Six Thousand - James Ellroy. It’s basically the Wizard of Oz retold with J Edgar Hoover as the Wicked Witch of the East and with Dorothy blowing her brains out at the end.
4. Her Last Call To Louis MacNeice - Ken Bruen. You know those Irish tourist board ads featuring sandy beaches, jolly times in pubs, pints of Guinness with shamrocks on them? Well Ken Bruen doesn’t write about any of that bollocks. He writes about smart crooks who know that there are many many uses for a good ten pound hammer.
3. Moby Dick - They’ve taken a three year passage on board a leaky nineteenth century whaling ship with a mad captain, dangerous harpoonists and the heavy hand of fate hanging over them. Let’s see the Sea Shepherds try their water hoses on these bad boys.
2. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller. Its WW2 through the eyes of Captain Yossarian a Jewish kid from Brooklyn who has become the bombardier on a B17. He has to laugh otherwise he will cry and cry. Ou sont les Snowdens d'antan?
1. Blood Meridian - Cormac McCarthy. Gun battles and horrific slaughter in the old west and Mexico. You'll try and get the wedding party massacre out of your head for the rest of your life. You wont succeed. McCarthy’s masterpiece.

Down These Green Streets

On his blog today Dec Burke announces the publication of Down These Green Streets, the definitive look at the history of Irish crime writing. For whatever reason crime fiction in Ireland today has become the dominant genre for this generation's writing talent. So called literary fiction is going through a stage of moribund middle class angst, the best Irish plays are being written by Englishmen, and contemporary Irish poetry probably peaked in the 70's with the circle around Seamus Heaney at Queens University Belfast. Almost all the exciting developments in Irish prose and certainly the most interesting Irish novels of the last twenty years have been in the crime fiction genre. Why is this the case? Read the book and you'll find out. There are essays by Dec Burke, Colin Bateman, John Banville, John Connolly, Ken Bruen, Stu Neville, Adrian McKinty, Tana French, et. al. The preface is written by one Michael Connolly and there's an afterword by Fintan O'Toole.  

Norn Iron Noir

If you're gonna be in Belfast on June 10 why you don't you tootle on down to No Alibis bookshop where the crime collection Requiems for the Departed is being launched. The cream of the Irish crime writing crop will be there and there will be wine and cheese and probably crackers...I'd guess Ritz reduced fat crackers, although I wouldnt be surprised if they served a generic Marks and Spencer water biscuit style cracker which, don't get me wrong, I like, but sometimes they can be a little dry - completely fine if the cheese is Brie but if it's a good stiff Edam or something then - watch out - the sensation isn't going to be that pleasant especially if you've got a tannic white wine working with it..., er, what was I, uh...oh yes Requiems. I've got a story in the book and although I wont be at the launch I will be there in spirit, or, possibly, asleep. This is the official NA notice:

No Alibis Bookstore is pleased to invite you to the launch of Irish crime fiction anthology, REQUIEMS FOR THE DEPARTED, edited by Gerard Brennan and Mike Stone, on Thursday 10th June at 6:30PM.

Along with co-editor Gerard Brennan (of Crime Scene NI fame), we're expecting appearances from the following contributors: Brian McGilloway, Stuart Neville, Arlene Hunt, T.A. Moore, Tony Bailie, John McAllister and Garbhan Downey, so this is sure to be an evening to remember.

If you want to hear something hilarious get Brian and Garbhan talking about ciars, er, I mean cars.

Lee Child

I reviewed the latest Lee Child in Saturday's Melbourne Age thus:

61 Hours
Like an un-killable creature in a Stephen King novel, Lee Child cannot now be stopped save by inordinate supernatural methods. Over the last decade he has joined Dan Brown and James Patterson in that pantheon of modern novelists who write critic-proof, guaranteed best sellers. If his publishers are to be believed a Lee Child book is sold somewhere in the world every second; this is no small achievement in what are bleak times for publishing houses seeking to lure young males from video games, television and surfing the internet, for, ehm, entertainment.
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Child excites envy and a grudging admiration among his peers. In their recent novel The Max Ken Bruen and Jason Starr described a sleazy and hilarious Lee Child clone called Sebastian nefariously patrolling the Greek Islands. Far from being offended at this portrayal of himself as an aging Lothario, Child read out portions of The Max at his launch party in New York. The fact that he can laugh at himself is not surprising for although his books are dark and violent, there’s a vein of ironic humour running through them too.
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Each new Lee Child novel is a continuation of the adventures of ex US military policeman Jack Reacher as he wanders the Earth like a latter day Kane from Kung Fu, never actually seeking trouble but somehow always finding it. 61 Hours takes place, obviously, over sixty one hours in the fictional town of Bolton, South Dakota during a blizzard. Jack Reacher has hitch-hiked a lift on a tourist bus full of pensioners which skids and breaks down on a lonely highway. He and the tourists must hunker down in Bolton while the snowstorm passes.
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Meanwhile the overstretched Bolton Police Department is on high alert because they have received a tip that a witness in a drugs deal is about to meet a sticky end via an out of state assassin. Throw in a lawless gang of bikers, a secret cold war base, a prison escape drama and a Mexican drug kingpin and you have all elements for a terrific thriller. The great location, the weather and the time compression make this one of the best books I have read in the Reacher series. There’s a little of Fargo and Ice Station Zebra in 61 Hours but that is no bad thing and although it’s pretty obvious what’s going to happen from about a third of the way in, you keep reading because you know that when all hell breaks loose it is going to be spectacular.
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Like a building on the frozen tundra Child’s prose is utilitarian and without unnecessary ornament. His sentences are terse and effective. Wit however permeates the book, from sly observations of prison etiquette to a funny riff on the names of Brazilian soccer players. I also like Reacher’s quintessentially American self confidence and natural authority. He is a modern form of that iconic male fantasy figure, the laconic cowboy who rides into town, sets the world to rights, breaks a few heads and hearts, rides out of town. Reacher is a true nomad with no family ties and who, eccentrically, doesn’t even like to stop moving to do his laundry. He is cast in the same mould as Shane or Ethan Edwards in The Searchers. This can have its drawbacks too: despite falling frequently in jeopardy you’re never really worried for Reacher because you know that he’s faster, smarter and more competent than everyone else in the book and that whatever happens he will live to see Jack Reacher #15, which should be along this time next year.
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But this is probably why Lee Child is so popular. Men need an escape from their desperate suburban world of school runs, windowless offices and Saturday morning trips to Ikea. Tough guy Jack Reacher doesn’t go to Ikea, when Jack Reacher needs a chair he takes his Bowie knife, walks into the forest and whittles one. Reacher’s fans should be pleased by 61 Hours. Child shows no sign of embracing the defensive (and usually disastrous) career arc that sees some popular writers trying their hand at more serious novels or non fiction investigations, of, say Jack the Ripper. With Reacher #14 Child sticks to his guns (and fists). Still, I can’t help but feel that Child has the intelligence and skill to stretch himself more than he allows. I wouldn’t mind seeing Reacher in the throws of loneliness or despair or the odd existential panic, you know, like the rest of us. And with large portions of the world’s forests apparently getting pulped to be turned into Jack Reacher novels it would be nice if they occasionally focused on complicated adult problems that can’t always be solved by a well aimed kick to the solar plexus.

Book of the Year

I read a lot of quality fiction this year from the likes of Garbhan Downey, Ken Bruen, Colum McCann, Hilary Mantel, AS Byatt, John McFetridge, Cormac McCarthy, Orhan Pamuk, Jonathan Lethem, Michael Chabon, Colin Bateman, Zadie Smith, Alan Glynn, Dec Burke, Gita Hariharan, Stu Neville et. al. but for me the novel I enjoyed most was Thomas Pynchon's Inherent Vice. At a party in July I had a bit of a friendly row about Inherent Vice with the crime reviewer of The Times; he felt that the book was disjointed and overly silly and not a proper crime novel but those were three of the reasons that I liked it. It is silly and its more of a riff on detective fiction than an attempt to fully engage the genre. Mainly though I liked the book because of its Big Lebowski vibe and the fact that its very funny. Chronologically it lies between The Crying of Lot 49 and Vineland and it sort of inhabits the same paranoid, druggy, conspiratorial, trippy, ascerbic universe. Here's a paragraph explaining why there are no blacks in Gordita Beach: "When a black family had actually tried to move into town [after the War] the citizens, with helpful advice from the Ku Klux Klan had burned their place to the ground and then as if some ancient curse had come into effect refused to allow another house ever to be built on the site. The lot stood empty until the town finally confiscated it and turned it into a park, where the youth of Gordita Beach by the laws of karmic adjustment were soon gathering at night to drink, dope, and f**k, depressing their parents though not property values particularly."
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I've already posted about Inherent Vice twice, here and here so that's probably enough for now.

Books For Christmas

The Guardian newspaper has picked my novel Fifty Grand as one of its books of the year and as a recommended book for Christmas (thank you Justine Jordan). Fifty Grand also got a nod as one of the books of the year by John O'Connell in the The New Statesman and I got a hat tip from Chris Mullin in The Observer. So far so good in Britain! but this is a novel which has struggled a bit in the US. The reasons for this are many: the bad economy didn't help; it also wasnt good that my editor left Holt two months before publication and that my replacement editor left two weeks before the pub day. Editors are crucially important in getting blurbs for books and getting them into the hands of reviewers. With 50G review copies were only sporadically sent out, were not followed up on, and there was no budget for publicity. I also think the subject matter may have been too controversial for some American reviewers. Still the success of Stuart Neville's Ghosts of Belfast shows you what a dedicated publishing house can do (it also helps that the book is f**king brilliant) and in the UK the success of Fifty Grand is all down to the hard work of Rebecca Gray, Anna-Marie Fitzgerald, Pete Ayrton et alia at Serpents Tail; and in Oz, Kate Hyde at Allen and Unwin. Word of mouth of course also helps and if you were one of the people who reviewed Fifty Grand on Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk or Good Reads or Audible.com rest assured that I not only read your review but showed it around the family and probably sent it to my agent to prove that "some people like me". Thank you very much, I really appreciate it.

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Blurbs are important too and I'd like to thank Ken Bruen for being an early champion of Fifty Grand. Finally a word about the blogosphere. Because I didn't get reviews in the likes of The New York Times, The Washington Post etc. I was more dependent than ever this year on bloggers for their support, so a big thank you to Declan Burke, Gerard Brennan, Peter Rozovsky, Dana King, Brian Lindemuth, Seana Graham, Sandra Ruttan, Brian O'Rourke, Liam Hoyle, Dan Wagner, Jolie Jordan, John McFetridge and many others - without you I'd be up the bloody creek. Thank you guys and gals. If there are going to be Adrian McKinty crime novels in the future (something I'm thinking quite hard about right now) it will largely be down to your support. Go raibh maith agaibh.

Novels of the Decade

Let me jump on the listmania bandwagon and give you my favourite novels of the decade. Maybe these aren't the best books of the noughties but they're the ones I liked most.

1. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
2. The Cold Six Thousand - James Ellroy
3. L'Amour est très surestimé - Brigitte Giraud
4. Grotesque - Natsuo Kirino
5. Let the Right One In - John Lindqvist
6. The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen
7. Her Last Call To Louis MacNeice - Ken Bruen
8. White Teeth - Zadie Smith
9. The Red Riding Quartet - David Peace
10. Fingersmith - Sarah Waters