Irish Authors Mystery

Carol is a divorced teacher living in a small town in Ireland, her only son now grown. A second chance at love brings her unexpected connection and belonging—and sparks a flurry of speculation. What does a woman like her see in a man like that? What happened to his wife who abandoned him and his children all those years ago? Carol and Declan know their relationship is the talk of the town, but the gossip only serves to bring the couple closer.

It was my father’s arrest that brought me here, although you could certainly say that I took the scenic route. Here is rehab, where Ben - the only son of a rich South Dublin banker - is piecing together the shattered remains of his life. Abruptly cut off, at the age of 27, from a life of heedless privilege, Ben flounders through a world of drugs and dead-end jobs, his self-esteem at rock bottom. Even his once-adoring girlfriend, Clio, is at the end of her tether. Then Ben runs into an old school friend who wants to cut him in on a scam.

A British Army bomb-disposal expert goes undercover to try to identify the source of the bombs being used by the Provisional Irish Republican Army in Pray for Us Sinners, a thrilling novel by New York Times best seller Patrick Taylor. In Belfast in 1973 the Troubles are raging. Two Ulstermen. Two sides. On one, British Army bomb-disposal officer Marcus Richardson; on the other, Davy MacCutcheon, Provisional IRA armourer who has been constructing bombs since his teens. Both men are committed to their causes until events shatter their beliefs, leaving each with a crisis of faith and an overpowering need to get out - but with honour.

Jack Irish - lawyer, gambler and people finder - is hunting down the villains who hijacked the winnings from his latest betting coup when he is hired by a mystery client to find missing barman Robbie Colbourne. But Robbie turns up dead of a drug overdose.

For years the boglands of Northern Europe have given up bodies of the long-deceased. Bodies that are thousands of years old, uncannily preserved. Bodies with strange injuries that suggest ritual torture and human sacrifice. When a corpse is found in a bog in Galway, Cormac Reilly assumes the find is historical. But closer examination reveals a more recent story. The dead man is Thaddeus Grey, a local secondary school principal who disappeared two years prior.

Jack Irish - lawyer, gambler and people finder - is hunting down the villains who hijacked the winnings from his latest betting coup when he is hired by a mystery client to find missing barman Robbie Colbourne. But Robbie turns up dead of a drug overdose.

Inishowen is a story of love found late, of hidden connections and a journey that changes three lives forever. There's Inspector Martin Aitken, whose life is a mess. Divorced, his career's in chaos. There are terrible things growing inside his house, and the last thing he needs is a collapsed woman in the street on Christmas Eve. There's Ellen Donelly, a woman on a mission, coming to Ireland to find her mother, and escape her husband. Milton Amery is her husband, an unfaithful New York plastic surgeon.

In this gothic, virtuoso debut collection, Mike McCormack dispenses nightmares both stylish and macabre. "A Is for Ax" offers alphabetized look at the killing of a parent, while the title story tracks a chilling sibling rivalry. Other works here offer multiple-quiz on the road to Calvary, a door-to-door saleswoman trafficking in strange and menacing feats, and a self-mutilating artist pushing himself to the limit. These sly and dangerous stories show us a young writer who was already a master of wicked formal play, and whose sly takes on life and death remain profoundly unsettling.

Winter brings more than fierce Atlantic storms to the thriving tourist town of Kylebeggan in County Kerry. On a cold January night, a woman is murdered and laid out in her wedding dress on her bed. And then another woman is discovered murdered in her flat, laid out in the same way. Weeks later, taxi driver Ellie Gillespie collects a bride-to-be on her hen night and drops her home. Ellie is horrified when this woman too is later discovered dead in her gown.

The opening story in this collection follows Vinny, Kevin, and a mourning family from Liverpool on a journey to Wales. What should be a simple trip turns into something much darker. A cross between Roddy Doyle and Ken Follett, this political storytelling meets you wherever you are on life’s journey, and stays with you.