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IRISH CRIME WRITERS
web links compiled by Cormac Millar

[ For the True Crime section click HERE ]

Irish mystery writers continue to proliferate, partly in response to a changing society. (To link to an article on "Irish noir" by Gerry McCarthy in the Sunday Times, June 2006, click here.) Of course many mainstream Irish novels have also hinged on crime. A list like this raises problems of definition. Roddy Doyle's The Woman Who Walked into Doors, apart from its extraordinary portrayal of an abusive marriage, is framed by a story of more conventional crime. Among the accolades heaped on Joseph O'Connor's Star of the Sea (2003) is that it is a "first-rate historical thriller". Patrick McCabe's hugely admired The Butcher Boy (1992) inhabits the mind of a psychotic juvenile killer. A recent article by Supreme Court Justice Adrian Hardiman even enquires whether James Joyce's Ulysses might not be classed as a murder mystery.

My list is less ambitious: it contains links to Irish or Irish-connected authors who have openly published in the mystery genre, sometimes under their own names. Not all of the books are set in Ireland; some Irish crimewriters have immersed themselves in foreign milieux so skilfully that one would hardly guess their origins without reading the biographical notes. Many do not have complete websites of their own. Some authors appear to have renounced the life of crime, while others remain productive in the field. Some Irish thriller writers are foreigners who have adopted the country. Their names are given in alphabetical order, and unlike my list of Seven Great Crime Novels, imply no value judgment (though some of the books are very good). The criteria used have been broad and flexible, except that accounts of purely paramilitary crime or terrorism have so far been excluded, as have children's books involving mystery plots, accounts of police and judicial malpractice, deaths caused by mental disturance, and a couple of sites where the information seems more than usually dubious. Other links may be added in the future; suggestions are welcome.

As the page grew beyond 70 authors it became unwieldly; it is gradually being re-organized by categories. (True crime, here marked TC, is the first category to get its own separate page.) Grateful thanks are due to Ms Deirdre Armstrong of the South Eastern Education and Library Board, Northern Ireland, for expert advice and additional information.

Liz Allen
Former crime correspondent of the Irish Independent; author of two thrillers, Last to Know (2003) and The Set-Up (2005).

Keith Baker
Former Head of News and Current Affairs for BBC Northern Ireland, author of psychological thrillers including Inheritance (1996), Reckoning (1998) and Lunenburg (2000).

John Banville
Celebrated Irish writer, some of whose mainstream novels (The Book of Evidence, Athena) are concerned with crime both amateur and professional; he has now begun to produce further crime books under the pseudonym Benjamin Black (Christine Falls, The Silver Swan).

Vincent Banville
Distinguished straight novelist who has also turned his hand to crime and to children's writing.

Alex Barclay
Dublin-based journalist. Her debut novel, Darkhouse, was an instant bestseller. The website has very fine graphics.

Sheila Barrett
American-born novelist, author of A View to Die For, published by Poolbeg.

Colin Bateman
Northern Irish writer with a wicked sense of humour, practising crime, children's literature and screenwriting; threatening to write opera.

Ingrid Black
Pseudonym of outspoken Irish journalist Eilis O'Hanlon, writing with her husband Ian McConnel. Their first novel, The Dead (2003), about a serial killer, won a Shamus award and was followed by The Dark Eye (2004).

Angela Bourke TC - see separate True Crime page.

John Boyne
Dublin-born author, graduate of Trinity College Dublin and the University of East Anglia Creative Writing MA. The majority of his books, from The Thief of Time through Crippen to his latest, Next of Kin, touch on murder.

John Brady
Canadian resident, Irish-born, Brady is the creator of Inspector Matt Miinogue, Dublin Murder Squad investigator.

Ken Bruen
Galway never seemed so dangerous. Bruen's books have garnered awards in several countries, and he gets a remarkably strong critical reception from North American reviewers: Publishers Weekly has named him "among the finest noir stylists of his generation".

Declan Burke
Hailed by Ken Bruen (q.v.) as "the future of Irish crime fiction [...] the writing is a joy", freelance writer Declan Burke is the author of two hardboiled crime novels: Eight-Ball Boogie (2003) and The Big O (2007). Has established an excellent Irish crime fiction blog.

Paul Carson
Carson is a doctor. There is a sharp medical edge to his thrillers, and his website.

Paul Charles
Gentle, understated, cerebral without being flashy, the Christy Kennedy series by Northern Irish novelist Paul Charles has reached its 8th volume.

Brian Cleeve
Anglo-Irish writer (1921-2003) and broadcaster; his books ranged from reference works to spiritual apologias for mysticism, and included spy novels such as Violent Death of a Bitter Englishman (1967) and Exit from Prague (1970)

Michael Collins
Irish-born, American-resident writer of rare talent, steadily gaining the recognition he deserves. Death and mystery inhabit several of his books. Criminal home page.

John Connolly
Huge international bestseller, formerly an Irish Times journalist. Does not use Irish settings. Excellent web site, generously informative.

Peter Costello
Biographer and non-fiction writer who has occasionally touched on true crime, for example in Conan Doyle, Detective: True Crimes Investigated by the Creator of Sherlock Holmes. Hardback editions were well received; a new paperback appeared in 2006.

John Creed
Eoin McNamee uses the name John Creed for writing thrillers, although some novels published under his own name also deal with criminal and violent themes.

Conor Cregan
Described as a Dubliner and a journalist, Cregan is author of five thrillers published by Hodder and by Coronet.

Freeman Wills Crofts
Dublin-born Crofts (1879-1957), educated in Northern Ireland, was one of the best-known English detective novelists of his day.

Barry Cummins TC - see separate True Crime page.

Mark Daniel -- VISITOR
Pseudonym of Mark Daniel Fitzgeorge-Parker, educated at "Ampleforth, Cambridge and HM Prison, Ashwell". A one-time UKIP parliamentary candidate, his tales of horse-racing malfeasance have been compared to Dick Francis. He set his 1990 thriller The Bold Thing in rural Ireland, where he was then living.

Philip Davison
Born in Dublin in 1957, Davison is the author of four espioniage novels featuring Harry Fielding, attached to Brtain's MI5, as well as other novels, plays and film scripts.

Cecil Day Lewis
Born in County Sligo in 1904, Day Lewis was educated in England, where he became Poet Laureate at the end of an eminient literary career. As Nicholas Blake, he wrote a series of crime novels featuring Nigel Strangeways, whom Julian Symons called "a real innovation, a truly literary detective". The Private Wound (1968) is set in the West of Ireland. Beautifully written, it has been called the most autobiographical of Day Lewis's mysteries.

Dicey Deere
American author of four crime novels featuring Torrey Tunet, translator and amateur detective, the latest being The Irish Village Murder (2004).

Eilís Dillon
Among her 50 published books were three detective stories from the 1950s, among the earlier novels of their kind to be set in Ireland.

Gerard Doherty TC - see separate True Crime page.

Terence Dooley TC - see separate True Crime page.

Ruth Dudley Edwards
Trenchant commentator and historian, creator of the most unladylike Baroness Jack Troutbeck.

Des Ekin
Assistant Editor with The Sunday World, Ekin is the author of two long psychological thrillers, Stone Heart (1999) and Single Obsession (2001).

Wolfgang Eulitz TC - see separate True Crime page.

H.J. Forrest
Pseudonym of Caroline Hussey, academic microbiologist, former Registrar of University College Dublin, and author of two murder mysteries: Publish or perish? (1991) and Murder by the Book (1992).

Frederick Forsyth -- VISITOR -- SHORT STORY WRITER
International bestselling author who lived in Ireland for some years and included several Irish-based stories in his 1982 collection, No Comebacks.

Tana French
A professional actress, her debut psychological thriller, In the Woods, was published in March 2007 and will shortly appear the US and other territories. Among other rave reviews, Books Ireland called it "gloriously written [...] the most impressive first novel I've read in ages".

Jenny Friel TC - see separate True Crime page.

Brian Gallagher
Dublin-based TV scriptwriter for RTE's "Fair City", his crime novels published by Poolbeg include Flight (2002), Pay Back (2003), and Pursuit (2004).

John Galvin
Serving member of the Garda Síochána, police force of the Irish Republic. Author of Bog Warriors (2000), a comic crime thriller set in Dingle, County Kerry, and The Mercury Man (2002), praised in Ireland on Sunday for its "well-written, punchy storytelling"..

Maggie Gibson
Author of seven novels, from The Longest Fraud (1996) to Blah Blah Black Sheep (2001).

Bartholomew Gill
American journalist, graduate of Trinity College Dublin, wrote sixteen police procedurals featuring Chief Superintendent Peter McGarr of the Murder Squad, An Garda Síochána.

Alan Glynn
Born in 1960, Glynn is a graduate of Trinity College Dublin. His thriller The Dark Fields, set in New York and featuring the strange side-effects of a mind-altering drug, appeared in 2001. Publishers Weekly called it "slick, suspenseful ... impeccably imagined and executed".

Hugo Hamilton
Has been publishing finely calibrated novels, short stories and memoirs since 1990; Headbanger (1996) and Sad Bastard (1998) are crime novels featuring Garda Pat Coyne.

Sean Harnett
Dubliner living in the West. His first murder mystery, Aisling Ltd (2006) was described by Karlin Lillington as "an enjoyable Irish take on the dotcom phenomenon".

Erin Hart
American midwestern writer with connections in theatre and Irish music. Author of two mystery novels concerning bodies found in Irish bogs: Haunted Ground (2003), and Lake of Sorrows (2004)

Shaun Herron
Born in Carrickfergus, Co. Down in 1912, Herron moved to Canada after serving in the Second World War, and worked as a religious minister and a journalist and editor. His novels include four mysteries, two of which were nominted for the Edgar Award of the Mystery Writers of America

Anna Heussaff
Of mixed Irish-Breton origins, media producer and director Anna Heussaff is a new Irish-language writer of crime and children's fiction. In Bás Tobann [Sudden Death] (2004), a Dublin couple move to the country and become embroiled in dark local secrets.

Jack Higgins
Belfast-born Higgins is an enormously productive and successful suspense writer, under at least five "pseudonyms" including his real name, Harry Patterson.

Paul Howard TC - see separate True Crime page.

Declan Hughes
Innovative playwright and theatre director; his extravagantly complex first crime novel, The Wrong Kind of Blood (2006), introduced private investigator Ed Loy. This was followed in 2007 by The Colour of Blood, praised by Publishers Weekly for its "sharp writing and strong local color". The Price of Blood (2008), featuring horse racing, has also had very strong American reviews. (Its British title is The Dying Breed.)

Fred Johnston
Belfast-born poet, living in Galway, founder of the Cúirt Literary Festival. His fourth novel, The Neon Rose (Bluechrome, 2007) is a crime story set in Paris.

Joe Joyce
First-rate investigative journalist and author of at least two crime novels, Off the Record (1990), and Trigger Man (1991) -- described in the Library Journal as "an exceptionally strong and moving addition to the action genre".

H.R.F. Keating -- VISITOR
Would not normally be claimed as an Irish crime writer, but Henry Raymond Fitzwalter Keating, the leading English crime specialist who was once a Scholar of Trinity College Dublin, did actually write a crime novel set in Ireland: The Dog It Was that Died.

Gene Kerrigan
Established chronicler of real-life Irish crime, corruption and miscarriages of justice, Kerrigan has recently moved into crime fiction.

Jim Lusby
Born in Waterford, living in Dublin, Jim Lusby is the author of seven crime novels, most featuring Garda Inspector Carl McCadden. He has also written short stories, stage and radio pieces.

Mick McCaffrey TC - see separate True Crime page.

Rory McCormac
Pseudonym of County Galway vet Muiris O'Scannell, author of 3 mysteries, Playing Dead (1996), Outbreak (1998) and Malpractice (2006). His detective, also a vet, is Frank Samson.

Eugene McEldowney
Belfast-born former Irish Times journalist, author of a series of crime novels featuring Superintendent Cecil Mcgarry.

Brian McGilloway
A native of Derry, where he teaches at St Columb's College. The first in his Inspector Devlin Series, Borderlands, was published by in April 2007; Marcel Berlins in The Times praised its "style and compassion ... command of plot and assurance of language".

Adrian McKinty
Described by crime fiction specialist Otto Penzler as "the super-talented Irishman", McKinty comes from Carrickfergus and lives in Colorado. Author of six crime novels including The Bloomsday Dead (2007).

Pauline McLynn
Multi-talented star of stage and screen (including Father Ted), Pauline McLynn has so far published five books including three mystery novels featuring likeable private investigator Leo Street.

Glenn Meade
A major international bestseller, Meade writes suspense thrillers dealing with dramatic historical and political events, not set in Ireland.

Cormac Millar
New(ish) Irish crimewriter; compiler of this list.

Sam Millar
Northern Irish thriller writer and prizewinning short-story writer; his latest novel is The Darkness of Bones.

Seán Moncrieff
Irish radio and TV presenter Moncrieff's crime novel Dublin (2002) deals with cocaine-snorting dropout Simon Dillon and his troubles with gangsters, women and cops. "A brilliant thriller" (Evening Herald).

John Mooney TC - see separate True Crime page.

Brian Moore
Although he later published political thrillers like The Statement and The Colour of Blood under his own name, Belfast-born Brian Moore disowned the pulp crime fiction that he wrote in the 1950s under the pseudonyms Bernard Mara and Michael Bryan.

Patricia Moyes
The originator of Inspector Henry Tibbett of Scotland Yard, Dublin-born Patricia Moyes (née Pakenham-Walsh) (1923-2000) authored 19 mysteries, from Dead Men Don't Ski (1959) to Twice in a Blue Moon (1993). The New York Times called her "one of the deftest practitioners of the British procedural detective novel".

Gerard Murphy
Born in Cork in 1956, Murphy is a scientist. His first crime novel featuring part-time private eye Michael A. Madigan was Death Without Trace (Collins Press, 2004).

Éilís Ní Dhuibhne
Award-winning writer in English and Irish. In her Irish-language mystery novel Dúnmharú sa Daingean [Murder in Dingle] (2000), an arty postmodern Dubliner moves to peaceful West Kerry only to stumble across a neighbour's corpse. Some contemporary aspirations are also left for dead.

Andrew Nugent
Former lawyer turned Benedictine monk, Nugent's debut novel was set in the Irish law courts. This was followed by Second Burial (2007), which opens with the bizarre murder of a Nigerian man in the Dublin Mountains.

Gemma O'Connor
Author of six well-received mysteries with a strong sense of the past.

Niamh O'Connor TC - see separate True Crime page.

Liam O'Flaherty
Apart from political thrillers such as The Assassin and The Informer, O'Flaherty's straight criminal works included The Puritan (1932), in which godly Francis Ferriter murders a prostitute in order to prove the existence of God; unfortunately, when finally cornered by Chief Superintendent Lavan, he finds he has mislaid his faith. Filmed in French in 1938, starring Jean-Louis Barrault.

T.P. O'Mahony
Cork journalist whose books from Poolbeg / Ward River Press included The Vatican Caper (1981) about the assassination of Pope Patrick I. The book was written after the sudden death of Albino Luciani, Pope John Paul I.

Emily O'Reilly TC - see separate True Crime page.

T.S. O'Rourke
Described on Wikipedia as "one of very few modern Irish crime writers," O'Rourke has published four novels with Breffni Books and Killynon House Books.

Orlaith O'Sullivan -- SHORT STORY WRITER
Joint winner of the inaugural Fish-Knife Award: The Crime Short-Fiction Prize 2006. Dublin-born, she has moved to Madeira to write fiction.

Julie Parsons
Born in New Zealand, Julie Parsons has lived in Dublin since 1963. She is the author of five psychological thrillers; her work has been translated into seventeen languages.

Sheila Pim
Dublin-born Sheila Pim (1909-1994) read French and Italian at Cambridge. She published four detective novels between 1945 and 1952; two have been reissued by the Rue Morgue Press.

Zane Radcliffe
Born and educated in Northern Ireland, Radcliffe is a former advertising copywriter in London and now Creative Director of an Edinburgh advertising agency. His three comic thrillers are London Irish (2002), Big Jessie (2003) and The Killer's Guide To Iceland (2005).

Patricia Rainsford
A former classical studies teacher, Rainsford's A Secret Place (2007) has been described as "not so much a crime novel as an exploration of human pain".

Ian Sansom
English-born resident of Northern Ireland, Sansom has created "one of literature's more unlikely detectives", Israel Armstrong, a Jewish vegetarian who drives a mobile library van along the North Antrim coast.

Michael Sheridan TC - see separate True Crime page.

Seamus Smyth
Author of Quinn (Hodder & Stoughton, 2000), described as "a dark & fascinating thriller - starring a modern day Moriarty and his plans to wipe out his entire family without a hint of foul play". Also available in Danish.

Gerry Stembridge
Notable theatre director, comedy producer and writer, Stembridge's crime-related works include the film Ordinary Decent Criminal (which starred Kevin Spacey and Linda Fiorentino) and the surreal stage-play The Gay Detective (which starred Peter Hanly). To say nothing of Stembridge's contribution to the composite mystery story, Yeats is Dead.

Peter Tremayne
Pseudonym of Peter Beresford Ellis, English author whose father comes from Cork. Has written 17 mystery novels about Sister Fidelma, 7th-century lawyer and daughter of the King of Cashel.

Liz Walsh TC - see separate True Crime page.

Paul Williams TC - see separate True Crime page.

Frank Wynne TC - see separate True Crime page.

Each of the above is entirely unique. W.H. Auden (great crime buff) remarked rather cattily about writerly self-absorption: "No poet or novelist wishes he were the only one who ever lived, but most of them wish they were the only one alive, and quite a number fondly believe their wish has been granted" ("Writing", in The Dyer's Hand, London, Faber, paperback edition 1975, p. 14). Short of a serial killer, Ireland's monstrous regiment of criminal writers seems likely to stay up to strength for the foreseeable future.

Please note that no connection is claimed or implied between the site www.cormacmillar.com and any of the other sites listed or linked. various reference sites and services have been used in compiling this page, including Google, Fantastic Fiction, Wikipedia, and Philip Casey's Irish Writers Online.

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