Published by No Exit Press,
26 November 2020.
ISBN: 978-1-84344-721-4 (PBO)
Lough Derg, in County Donegal, the Irish Republic, is
where St Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, is said to have caught a glimpse
of Purgatory on an island – Station Island, in the centre of the lough. Since
then, for over a thousand years, it has been the site of a pilgrimage for numerous
devout Catholics who undergo three days of fasting, sleep deprivation, and
walking over rough stones and sharp pebbles so that through their pain and
suffering and by taking part in various rituals on their progress around the
island they pay tribute to the suffering of Christ while on the Cross.
But not everyone who comes to the
island is inspired by devotion. In 1994, as the Troubles which had been tearing
Northern Ireland apart for years are now showing the possibility of peace, one
person whose purpose is not devotional is Belfast detective Desmond Maguire. He
has come to Lough Derg to meet with an informer whom he knows only as ‘Ruby’
from whom he has in the past obtained good information about violence planned
by the IRA. However, not all Ruby’s information is good: the last had resulted
in Maguire with three colleagues being ambushed at a remote farmhouse. Maguire
had not been harmed but all his colleagues had been killed. As one of the few
Catholics in the Royal Ulster Constabulary, Maguire has never been fully
trusted by his colleagues while the Catholic community, north and south, regard
him as a turncoat. And he cannot provide more clues as to who Ruby is: Ruby has
ever only been a voice whispering down the telephone late at night, providing information,
which is sometimes right, sometimes wrong.
On the day of the ambush Maguire
received a picture postcard of Lough Derg and the island with its monastic
buildings; on the back is a message to ‘Dear Turncoat’ with a list of
confession times at the monastery with one name – Father Liam Devine –
underlined. Partly under pressure from his boss, Chief Inspector Alan Pearson, who
is himself under pressure from Special Branch and the British Secret Service,
to find out more about Ruby, but also because of the increasing psychological
burden of his situation, Maguire takes himself to Lough Derg in the hope that
the elusive Ruby will manifest himself. When he gets to the island, the
majority of the pilgrims are clearly what they say they are. But not all. There
are two policemen from the Irish police (the Garda Siochana), Paddy and Kieron,
who trot round after him like suspicious dogs and watch his every step. There
is a detective from the Garda, Inspector Marley, with an abrupt, sinister
manner. And Perpetua, a beautiful young woman, kind, gentle but enigmatic. Who
are they really? Can any of them be trusted?
Meanwhile, Pearson and his Special
Branch colleague are analysing Maguire’s actions: can he be trusted? And in the
paranoid atmosphere of the Troubles, can they? Can anyone trust anyone else?
This excellent novel has been
described as a ‘metaphysical detective story’. Maguire’s growing difficulty in
differentiating truth from falsehood in his own thoughts and actions, his
unbearable guilt at what he has been caught up in, and his increasing
consumption of large amounts of alcohol are all contributing to his mental
instability, his feeling that he is adrift and unmoored from reality. The names
of some of the characters have a symbolic resonance: the ghost Marley in
Charles Dickens’ Christmas Carol is
there to warn Scrooge to mend his ways. This Marley is not a ghost, but is he
performing the same function? And Perpetua is the name of a 1st
century saint and martyr whose diary may be among the first Christian writings
to indicate that to follow one’s conscience, one’s inner voice, was preferable
to obeying the commands of the state. Is that what this Perpetua is indicating
to Maguire?
Turncoat is not an easy read. The mists and
shadows that envelope the island parallel the mists and shadows in Maguire’s
mind, and I am not sure the story comes to a conclusion. (Maybe there’ll be a
follow-on). But it is thoughtful and beautifully written. Highly recommended.
------
Reviewer: Radmila May
Anthony
Quinn is an Irish writer and
journalist. His debut novel Disappeared was shortlisted for a
Strand Literary Award by the book critics of the Guardian, LA Times,
Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, and other US newspapers. It was also
listed by Kirkus Reviews as one of the top ten thrillers of 2012. His short
stories have twice been shortlisted for a Hennessy/New Irish Writing award.
Radmila May was
born in the U.S. but has lived in the U.K. since she was seven apart from seven
years in The Hague. She read law at university but did not go into practice.
Instead she worked for many years for a firm of law publishers and still does occasional
work for them including taking part in a substantial revision and updating of
her late husband’s legal practitioners’ work on Criminal Evidence published
late 2015. She has also contributed short stories with a distinctly criminal
flavour to two of the Oxford Stories anthologies published by Oxpens Press – a
third story is to be published shortly in another Oxford Stories anthology –
and is now concentrating on her own writing.
