Relentlessly downbeat noir from Irish writer Ken Bruen picks up where he left off with highly tarnished detective Jack Taylor at the end of The Dramatist; coming back from a nervous breakdown after accidentally contributing to the death of a child in his care.
Things don't get much rosier from there, as Jack starts to look into the beheading of a pedophile priest and tries to help a friend with a stalker, all the while struggling against alcoholism.
Fairly rough pavement, as one might suspect, but Bruen writes in a dark-humored vein favorably reminiscient of Roddy Doyle, if the author of The Snapper and The Commitments were to turn to hard-boiled detective fiction. But I enjoy Bruen's style and plotting, right up to another punch-in-the-gut finale, and would recommend him to readers who think the Hard Case Crime series is too light and cheery.
I checked this out from the Morrison-Reeves Library in Richmond, Indiana, and read it at a good clip.
No comments:
Post a Comment