A chilling noir novel set in the Belfast of The Troubles in which Pat Gray introduces us to the flawed but dogged and honourable policeman McCann. It is a welcome return to fiction after an eighteen year silence by one of Ulster’s finest novelists. Eight years in C Division was a long stretch for any man to be in one of the worst posts. That would break the toughest fellow. That would make you wonder if McCann was really the man for the job. Inspector McCann is called to investigate the brutal murder of a teenage girl, at first assuming it is a sex crime or sectarian tit-for-tat killing. But another girl is killed and then his prime suspect castrated and murdered. He finds himself trapped in vicious old rivalries, unsupported and alone. Are the murders connected to ‘Dirty Tricks’ by the combatants in Ireland’s war, or has McCann lost the plot, as his boss suggests? Following the success of The Political Map of the Heart, Pat Gray’s second Belfast novel is detective fiction that is bloodier and darker than anything he has previously written. ‘Creepily compelling, Gray’s fourth novel probes deeply into darkness, weaving an atmosphere of tension and distrust that permeates every part of McCann’s investigation, including his relationships with colleagues. It’s masterfully done, but chilling and hard-hitting stuff.' Alastair Mabbott in The Herald
Growing up during the Depression in a small Indiana town, I had never seen a mountain or an ocean when I was twenty-one and had scarcely been outside the state. I had a passion for travel and set out alone for California after World War II. I discovered a new world of sunny beaches, housing shortages, and a job as a traveling saleslady for a music publisher. My territory was everything west of the Mississippi. In Montana, I met a young University band director and married him. Montana was great at first, but twelve years and three children later, I felt as trapped as I had in Indiana. Soon my husband got a job in California and life became exciting once more as we traveled the state, camping at beaches and parks on weekends and vacations. When the kids became teenagers, we decided to camp Europe, so we saved furiously in order to go. It was the trip of a lifetime and it infected the whole family with the "travel bug;" the kids became exchange students, citizens of the world. Once they went off to college and became adults, I found adventure on my own traveling the globe.
After the sudden death of his owner, the Cat finds himself abandoned without food in an unfurnished house. Initially he consorts with his old friends, Mouse and Rat -- one addicted to cheese and philosophy, the other to flashy Italian suits and style -- but gradually he gives way to his normal cat-like urges. At first guilty, then elated at his new freedom and its beneficial impact on the other residents, the Cat falls prey to a new and troubling vision of how the house might be with more initiative and enterprise -- and more discipline for the likes of Mouse and Rat. Gradually the Cat unleashes new forces onto the house and the gardens beyond, achieving ever-greater things, except that, as he does so, he finds himself more and more alone. Based on the classic themes of love and friendship, of outsider and insider, of eating to live and living to eat, of substance and style, loyalty and betrayal, leadership, ambition, and domination, the book follows the Cat to his final home.
Special ops had prepared him for every danger... except a confrontation with a pregnant woman Gray Turner lived by his instincts. But they went on the fritz the moment his old high school crush walked through his door. Her son had been kidnapped and Katie had nowhere else to turn. Gray was her only hope of finding her boy before he was taken across the northern border. And she'd do anything to secure Gray's cooperation.... With Gray the mission always came first. But the Special Ops manual never covered difficult pregnant women or how to get them out of your head. Somehow he'd have to ignore his long-smoldering attraction to Katie before he relinquished all control....
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