Title: Black IrishAuthor: Stephan TaltyPublisher: Ballantine BooksPublication Date:  February 26, 2013Reviewer: Ethan

Summary: In this explosive debut thriller by the New York Times bestselling au-thor of Empire of Blue Water, a brilliant homicide detective returns home, where she confronts a city’s dark demons and her own past while pursuing a brutal se-rial killer on a vengeful rampage.

Absalom “Abbie” Kearney grew up an outsider in her own hometown. Even being the adopted daughter of a revered cop couldn’t keep Abbie’s troubled past from making her a misfit in the working-class Irish American enclave of South Buffalo. And now, despite a Harvard degree and a police detective’s badge, she still struggles to earn the respect and trust of those she’s sworn to protect. But all that may change, once the killing starts.

When Jimmy Ryan’s mangled corpse is found in a local church basement, this sadistic sacrilege sends a bone-deep chill through the winter-whipped city. It also seems to send a message—one that Abbie believes only the fiercely secretive citizens of the neighborhood known as “the County” understand. But in a town ruled by an old-world code of silence and secrecy, her search for answers is stonewalled at every turn, even by fellow cops. Only when Abbie finds a lead at the Gaelic Club, where war stories, gossip, and confidences flow as freely as the drink, do tongues begin to wag—with desperate warnings and dire threats. And when the killer’s mysterious calling card appears on her own doorstep, the hunt takes a shocking twist into her own family’s past. As the grisly murders and grim revelations multiply, Abbie wages a chilling battle of wits with a maniac who sees into her soul, and she swears to expose the County’s hidden history—one bloody body at a time.

With Black Irish, Stephen Talty stakes a place beside Jo Nesbø, John Sandford, and Tana French on the cutting edge of psychological crime thrillers.

Review: The sanctity of a local Buffalo, NY church is forever compromised when

the maimed corpse of Jimmy Ryan is discovered in the basement. Tied to a chair,

eyelids cut off as if he were made to look at something, the sight of Ryan's body

sends a shock through the town. Author Stephan Talty describes the southern

part of Buffalo, the County,  as having a "small-town feeling". Its best days be-

hind it, the County is a place where news travels fast and nothing stays secret for

long.

Enter Absolam "Abbie" Kearny. Despite growing up in the County, she has al-

ways been a kind of outsider. Adopted at a young age by John Kearny, a local po-

lice legend, she has now returned to follow in her father's infamous footsteps.

Tasked with the Ryan case, she is quickly met with resistance from the local

townspeople and police.

The County is mostly made up of Irish immigrants. As Abbie digs deeper into the

murder, connections, both historical and personal, begin to reveal themselves. As

further murders occur, Abbie struggles to stay ahead of the killer. The Buffalo

police run an investigation parallel to hers, and Abbie soon finds herself a sus-

pect in the case. As the tension rises Abbie is forced to question her sanity and

family history, all culminating in a shocking twist that is sure to leave readers

riveted.

With his debut work of fiction, Stephan Talty instantly places himself among the

great modern thriller authors such as Dennis Lehane and Tana French. Like

Lehane and French, Talty manages to maintain exceptional characters, setting

and suspense without ever sacrificing the integrity of his writing. This novel

could have easily become a standard thriller, but Talty daftly takes his time to

build each character, allowing the suspense to stay at a constant boil. In Abbie,

Talty has imagined a believable protagonist, whose flaws and vulnerability allows

readers to connect with her emotions and desire to succeed. I was hooked on this

novel from beginning to end. Fascinated by the serial killer who tells, "his autobi-

ography through corpses", I was shocked at the final turn that the events took.

This exceptional novel has everything thriller fans have come to expect and gives

them more than they could ever have hoped for.

-Ethan