Created by Sam Millar
Hey, man, smell my finger.
There’s never quite been a P.I. like Belfast’s KARL KANE.
I mean, most P.I.s, the author really tries to get you to like them. But you get the feeling Sam Millar doesn’t give a flying fuck in the well-received Bloodstorm (2008) which introduces Kane — you either take Kane as he is, or piss off.
Certainly, he’s a far cry from most private eye series heroes. More than a few gumshoes are walking wounded, and Kane is no exception: he’s frequently hungover, he’s always scratching his arse (and always seemingly one step from daring the reader to take a whiff), and he seems to have the moral sense of a dung heap. He’s truly damaged goods: a molested child who witnessed his mother’s rape and murder, and the book itself is a deep, dark wallow in about twenty different kinds of nastiness; a violent noir odyssey of failure — of justice, of mercy and of nerve.
The neo-noristas will love it…
Born in Belfast, Ireland, the author has received umerous literary awards including The Brian Moore Award for Short Stories, the Aisling Award for Art and Culture, The Martin Healy Short Story Award, and The Cork Literary Review Writer’s Award. According to Millar, he also spent “most of my young life in Long Kesh prison for my political beliefs and spent other time (too long) in American penitentiaries before President Bill Clinton mercifully pardoned me and sent my sorry you-know-what back to Ireland.”
UNDER OATH
- “… poor aul’ Karl Kane seems to find himself sinking lower into damnation with each plot turn.”
— Gerard Brennan, Crime Scene NI - “… a real find for aficionados of the classic hard-boiled novel who would like to see the form updated without it smelling like an anachronism.”
— Steve Glassman in Booklist - “Those looking for a comfortable read should be warned… Even Sam Spade would be shocked at some of the company Karl Kane keeps and the situations he finds himself in.”
— Irish Independent - “Gripping and arrestingly violent, Bloodstorm is a well-written thriller with its share of disturbing insights into the dark side of the human psyche.”
— Irish Mail on Sunday - “(Past Darkness) “This amazing novel unleashes a torrent of savagery, made bearable by Irish author Millar’s considerable literary gifts.””–Booklist
— Booklist
NOVELS
- Bloodstorm (2008) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
- The Dark Place (2010) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
- Dead of Winter (2012) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
- Past Darkness (2015) | Buy this book | Kindle it!
RELATED LINKS
- Irish Eyes, Smiling or Otherwise
Private eyes of the Emerald Isle.
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
