I’ve jumped on the bandwagon. She spins a great yarn in ‘The Good Turn’, so now I’m keen to read her previous two, ‘The Ruin’ and ‘The Scholar’. Since the GFC she’s been a resident of Western Australia, but she was born in County Cork, practising as a lawyer on the Emerald Isle. It is perhaps natural that her tomes are set in her birth homeland rather than her adoptive one.

Her third novel again features Detective Cormac Reilly, whom I hope I’ll encounter again very soon. In this tale he’s figuring that those above him on the slippery slope, giving the orders, may not be as pure as the driven Irish snow. But those notions are temporarily put to one side as a possible abduction is reported. Soon his sidekick, Garda Peter Fisher, is hot on the heels of the supposed perpetrator. Then the latter’s inexperience and brashness upends the investigation and he’s banished to a small town to keep his head down until the furore that’s developed over the investigation subsides. His big problem is that he’s placed in the care of his father, a cop used to taking short cuts to get a desired result. This approach leads to more trouble for Peter when he investigates a supposed open and shut case of a double murder out in the countryside.

Meanwhile, Reilly’s suspicions about the upper echelons have landed him in hot water too, with his personal life catching up with him as well – as is so often the case with jaded coppers. He’s basically not a happy chappy as his delvings start to come full circle.

Peter, back in the boondocks, is up to his neck in similar ordure as he discovers an elderly rellie, formerly in peak condition, is ailing under the care of a reticent newcomer to the community and her silent daughter.

Eventually the two hard done by policefellows and their investigations collide as McTiernan tidily brings it all back together in a fitting finale. It’s all ripe for a television adaptation and the book has been, justifiably, a top seller on these shores. Aussie crime writing does not get ant better, even if it is set far from the Land of Oz.

The author’s website = http://dervlamctiernan.com/