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Published May 2009
208 pages
Genre: Mysteries
Publication Information
When a letter containing a list of victims arrives in the post, P.I. Jack Taylor tells himself that it’s got nothing to do with him. He has enough to do just staying sane. His close friend Ridge is recovering from surgery, and alcohol’s siren song is calling to him ever more insistently.
A guard and then a judge die in mysterious circumstances. But it is not until a child is added to the list that Taylor determines to find the identity of the killer, and stop them at any cost. What he doesn’t know is that his relationship with the killer is far closer than he thinks. And it’s about to become deeply personal.
Spiked with dark humor, and fueled with rage at man’s inhumanity to man, this is crime writing at its darkest and most original.
"In his seventh time out, Taylor isn't as compelling as he has been, or needs to be, to compensate for Bruen's pedestrian plotting. " - Kirkus Reviews
"Taylor confronts the unlikely killer in what is a less than convincing showdown." - Publishers Weekly
"Bruen's deft effort is recommended for all mystery collections." - Library Journal
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Ken Bruen is one of the most prominent Irish crime writers of the last two decades. Born in Galway, he spent twenty-five years traveling the world before he began writing in the mid 1990s. As an English teacher, Bruen worked in South Africa, Japan, and South America, where he once spent a short time in a Brazilian jail. He has two long-running series: one starring a disgraced former policeman named Jack Taylor, the other a London police detective named Inspector Brant.
Praised for their sharp insight into the darker side of today's prosperous Ireland, Bruen's novels are marked by grim atmosphere and clipped prose. Among the best known are his White Trilogy (1998-2000) and The Guards (2001), the Shamus award-winning first novel in the Jack Taylor series. The next Jack Taylor ...
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