The Sean Duffy series - Adrian McKinty reviewed by The Bookchook

The riot had taken on a beauty of its own now. Arcs of gasoline fire under the crescent moon. Crimson tracer in mystical parabolas…Helicopters everywhere: their spotlights finding one another like lovers in the Afterlife.

So begins the Sean Duffy series, written by Ulster-born Adrian McKinty, set in the turbulent Troubles era of Northern Ireland. This series has all the elements of a good crime thriller – fast, gritty, violent and political. What makes this series rise above others is the wry humour and lyrical penmanship of its author, which brilliantly evokes the sense of time and place in the midst of unholy chaos. McKinty does not seek to explain the events of the time, but rather recaptures and re-creates the emotions and atmosphere within the context of a crime thriller.

The main character, Sean Duffy, is a smart, hard-drinking rogue (aren’t they always), RUC policeman living in Belfast. The only Catholic in his Protestant housing estate, his daily routine begins by checking under his BMW for “mercury tilt” explosives. However, it is Duffy’s sense of truth and justice, his humanity regardless of which side of the political or religious divide they fall, that is central to all three books of the series.

The books are all set within the framework of The Troubles. Book 1 The Cold, Cold Ground, is set against the 1981 hunger strikes and the death of Bobby Sands. What starts out as a serial killer case soon leads to Special Branch, protection rackets and paramilitary organisations, all playing dangerous games.

Book 2 I Hear the Sirens in the Street, sees Duffy investigating the events surrounding the dismembered body of a 60 year old man, found in a suitcase. This is the time of the De Lorean car factory in Ireland, when tensions between opposing alliances were at breaking point and the hopelessness of the unemployed was extreme. Against this bleakness, the humour of the dialogue makes this, surprisingly, a very funny read.

The third in the series In the Morning I’ll be Gone, is by far the best. The book begins with the mass breakout of IRA prisoners from the notorious Maze prison, one of whom is master bomber Dermot McCann, sometime friend of Duffy. Duffy is called upon to solve a cold case murder in order to prevent an IRA assassination. In the midst of this, there is also a ‘locked-room’ murder mystery to be solved, all cleverly drawn around an atmosphere of betrayal, corruption and passions. Despite being constantly accused of gross professional misconduct, it is Duffy’s empathy and humanity which ultimately succeed.

Sprinkled throughout this series are a smattering of historical figures, from Gerry Adams to the rants of Ian Paisley, Maggie Thatcher and Joe Kennedy (nephew to JFK). One of the funniest descriptions was of Kennedy’s hair.

I had to admit that he was impressive. You noticed the hair first. Kennedy’s hair was far in advance of anything Ireland had to offer. It was space-age hair. It was hair for the new millennium. Irish hair was stuck somewhere in 1927. Kennedy hair had put man on the f…..g moon.

McKinty set out to write this series as a trilogy, but pressure from his publishers and a dream he had for the ending of a new Sean Duffy book, has resulted in a fourth book. Gun Street Girl has just been released in the UK and US and soon in Australia.

While each book in the series may be read as a standalone, I would strongly recommend reading them in order. Razor sharp, bleak, funny, gritty and complex – all are great reads, made even better by Mr McKinty’s recent conversion to Australian citizenship and currently residing in Melbourne! And, according to the Wall Street Journal and the Irish Examiner, Belfast is the ‘hip’ new Scandinavia. Sounds fine by me.

McKinty set out to write this series as a trilogy, but pressure from his publishers and a dream he had for the ending of a new Sean Duffy book, has resulted in a fourth book. Gun Street Girl has just been released in the UK and US and soon in Australia.

While each book in the series may be read as a standalone, I would strongly recommend reading them in order. Razor sharp, bleak, funny, gritty and complex – all are great reads, made even better by Mr McKinty’s recent conversion to Australian citizenship and currently residing in Melbourne! And, according to the Wall Street Journal and the Irish Examiner, Belfast is the ‘hip’ new Scandinavia. Sounds fine by me
 Visit Newcastle Region Library's Catalogue and Website.