The Ghosts of Belfast

Fegan was a hit man for the IRA. During the height of The Troubles he killed a dozen people including women and children. Now out of prison, he drinks to try to get peace, but the spirits of the 12 people he killed follow him night and day, and will not allow him a moments peace. Are they only in his mind, or do they really walk beside him? He comes to realize that there is only one way to make these ghosts stop tormenting him: by taking revenge on the leaders of the movement that ordered the killings. So Fagan hunts the Belfast night looking for the former IRA leaders that ordered him to kill, but Belfast is not the city it was when he was sent away. The Good Friday accord has changed things, but bitter and lingering hatred still burns... This was a searing novel of guilt and retribution, now that peace has come to Ireland at last, Fagan is tormented by the fact that he killed for nothing, and that he took the fall and bears the shame while those who ordered the killings are called peacemakers. Some of the Irish slang and assumed knowledge of The Troubles and the subsequent peace accords can be a little confusing (Google and Wikipedia can clear that up) but that is the only stumbling block in reading this haunting and thought provoking thriller that will stay with you long after you turn the last page.

A semblance of peace has finally come to Northern Ireland. However, there will never be peace for Gerry Fegan, former terrorist. He is constantly harassed by twelve ghosts, referred to as the "followers." Ever since he was a child, Fegan has been able to communicate with the dead. First, it was his father. Now it is the men and women he killed when he was a hit man for the IRA. They won't leave him alone until he assassinates those who ordered them killed. "The Ghosts of Belfast" is an excellent supernatural thriller. Depicting a tremendous amount of bloodshed, it is one of the most violent novels I have ever read. A few scenes made me squeamish, especially those pertaining to the slow torture of undercover informants (touts). There are also storefront bombings, brutal dog fights and street rioting. Nonstop action abounds as a dangerous war erupts on the streets of Belfast. The participants don't know who to trust because there are traitors on both sides. Northern Ireland's bloody past collides with the present as Fegan launches a one-man campaign to avenge the ghosts of Belfast. Think "The Sixth Sense" meets "Death Wish." Fegan must be careful to elude capture by the police as well as IRA operatives who are now high profile politicians. The reader can't help but sympathize with Fegan. As a young, troubled man with no guidance or direction, he was lured into the IRA as a pawn--someone to be used and disposed of like a pit bull in a dog fight. All he wants is a normal life. Fegan repents for what he has done in the past and he is willing to do anything to free himself of the ghosts. Meanwhile, he has fallen in love with a beautiful woman, Marie McKenna, who has a small daughter, Ellen. He can never have Marie. Two of the ghosts that haunt him are a woman and her baby who were killed by one of his bombs. He must fight to avenge the ghost mother and her baby while fighting to protect a living mother and her baby. Fegan turns into a type of anti-hero whom the reader cheers as he dispatches the evil men around him. A debut novel from Stuart Neville, "The Ghosts of Belfast" is highly recommended for fans of action and horror. It is a fast-paced suspense ride with a high body count. When Gerry Fegan is forced to relive the past, the reader is provided a graphic account of how each of his innocent victims died horribly. The reader will also want to see them avenged. The question that haunted me throughout the novel is: Will Fegan ever be free of all the ghosts? According to its jacket, this novel is a first in a series. Greatly intrigued, I can't help but wonder if, in future installments, other ghosts will come to Fegan, beseeching him for vengeance. Neville`s next novel, "Collusion," will be published in 2010. Joseph B. Hoyos

Even the simplest of a plot synopsis is in danger of giving away too much. A retired IRA assassin is haunted by the ghosts of those he has killed and driven by them to reap vengeance upon others. I almost passed on this because I did not want to read a 'ghost story' and that would have been a loss. The plot rips along as the bodies pile up and the intrigues of a host of other characters all become entangled. If you like Stephen Hunter, George Pelecanos, Ian Rankin...you will want to read this book. This book is advertised as the first in a series. There are so many dead bodies by the end, you will wonder how Neville will put together a sequel. But when he does, I will buy it.

Gerry Fegan is haunted by the ghosts of the people he killed, unrelenting shadows seeking revenge for their untimely deaths. Victims of Belfast political violence, in which Fegan took active part, the ghosts torment him until he systematically executes the political figures and henchmen who orchestrated the violence. THE GHOSTS OF BELFAST is rich in local color. Neville tells his story so naturally, the reader is unaware of what must have been hundreds of hours of research into police procedure, political vernacular, and urban geography. Neville illuminates the underbelly of an Ulster still bleeding from decades of strife. This debut novel doesn't read like a debut novel; it reads like the work of a seasoned novelist. Neville is a craftsman with words; he paints exquisitely vivid you-are-there scenes, showing us the dirt, the blood, the anguish---and the ghosts. The opening pages will get your attention. The rest of the book will live up to their promise. Some thrillers perpetuate the genre, some buck the trend and break new ground. This is one of the latter, one destined to plant its author well in the midst of the venerable thriller writers already welcoming him to their club.

THE GHOSTS OF BELFAST, the first novel by young master wordsmith Stuart Neville, is by turns bleak, gut wrenching and tense. Haunted by the spectres of the twelve victims whose blood he has on his mortal soul, ex-IRA hitman Gerry Fegan must appease them by murdering the men who ordered their deaths. Nothing less will suffice. The fallout from Fegan's bloody expiations threaten to disrupt a fragile country barely on the mend. THE GHOSTS OF BELFAST breathes with you - it's unnervingly vivid and merciless, sparing you nothing of ex-IRA hitman Gerry Fegan's burden of pain, guilt and weariness. Page by page, you feel Fegan's struggle with his past colleagues and his own heart strain his very sanity. Neville has an instinctive sense-of-place in his writing that hearkens back not only to Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man but also to the writings of legendary Texas writers Rolando Hinojosa-Smith and Cormac McCarthy. Having never spent any time in Ireland, I not only saw and heard Armagh and Belfast, I felt, deep in the marrow of my bones, those cities' war-fatigue, wariness and fear of plunging back towards the black abyss of loathing and violence; I chafed at the hot hate festering within those for whom the past is an ever-present and unending prison of the mind and heart, even while the younger generations move past them towards hopeful futures, seemingly oblivious to past bloodshed, knowing nothing of the shudders of sudden bomb blasts. Make no mistake, THE GHOSTS OF BELFAST surpasses its genre. It is a truly stunning debut wrought by a young master of rare talent, insight and truth. No one gets away clean here, including Fegan. I've cut my teeth on the best published works of writers like James Ellroy and Don DeLillo. I have every confidence that young Mr. Neville is superbly capable of joining their ranks in due time. This books'dénouement and ending left me stunned, surprised and nearly in tears. Most highly recommended.