Purgatory: A Jack Taylor Noir Thriller - Softcover

Ken Bruen was born in Galway, Ireland. After turning down a place at RADA, and completing a doctorate in Metaphysics, he spent 25 years as an English teacher in Africa, Japan, South East Asia and South America. An unsheduled stint in a Brazilian prison where he suffered physical and mental abuse spurred him to write and, after a brief spell teaching in London, he returned to Galway, where he now lives with his daughter.

*Starred Review* Unusually flush, sober, and settled into a new apartment stocked to the gills with books, Jack Taylor is no longer entertaining requests to hunt Galway’s disappeared, identify the tormenters of its marginalized, or root out authoritarian abusers. But Jack’s reputation as the man who’ll deliver some manner of truth and justice stands, and he’ll not walk away from Galway’s darkness easily. C33, a vigilante killing criminals who have escaped legal justice through technicalities, seems to think Jack is a suitable playmate. Dropping Jack a note about the latest killing, C33 identifies the next mark and signs off with, “Your turn.” Despite the challenge, Jack hopes to avoid jumping back into the mix and sets his ally Stewart on C33’s heels. In the meantime, Jack becomes entangled with Reardon, a crazy surfer mogul snatching up parts of Galway. Throughout, Jack’s brutal inner voice shouts dire predictions as his attempts to avoid past mistakes lead to disasters for his friends and a hunt for the killer he’s foolishly dismissed. Bruen’s storytelling style, a stream-of-consciousness mix of prose and verse, strips away Galway’s tourist-board facade and offers a darkly comic social commentary. Jack Taylor tales don’t end well; that’s just not the life our Jack’s living. But Bruen always respects his characters, and they end right. Noir fans will find exactly what they love here. Note to RA librarians looking for links: The BBC series Jack, based on the Jack Taylor series, is now available in the U.S., and it’s almost as good as the books. --Christine Tran