This feels like a good time to be reading a novel set in post-boom Ireland in which hard-pressed cops are struggling along with diminished and inadequate resources to keep control of a criminal landscape spiralling out of control with violent crime and murders reaching the sort of frequency typically associated with US inner cities.
The topical context is a welcome bonus, but, of course, there's never a bad time to read a cleverly-consructed, well written, sophisticated police procedural teeming with strong, memorable characters and unpredictable, but convincing plot turns.
And that is what Rob Kitchin delivers in his second novel The White Gallows.
Detective Superintendent Colm McEvoy is a man under pressure. Every time his phone rings, the investigative officer of the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation, is confronted with yet another major crime requiring his attention. As he nears the first anniversary of the death of his wife from cancer, McEvoy struggles to balance the demands of his family with a crippling case load that is further weighed down by two murders in one morning.
McEvoy is first called out early on a Sunday morning to the body a young man brutally killed in what officers quickly decide is likely to have been the result of a fight between rival Lithuanian immigrants. While there, however, his phone rings again and this time he is alerted to the death of wealthy industrialist, Albert Koch. Although at first Koch's death is not regarded as being suspicious, it is politically sensitive and McEvoy's superiors decide that it should take priority.
It doesn't take McEvoy long, once arrived at the scene of the crime, that he is dealing with another murder and the high profile involved demands that he run the investigation while delegating other crimes to his small and hard-pressed team.
It's not easy to go into too much detail regarding the plot of The White Gallows without straying into spoiler territory, and so suffice it to say that McEvoy finds that the death of a wealthy man - one perhaps hiding a number of dark secrets - leaves no shortage of potential suspects, from family members and senior colleagues covetous of his wealth and position to envious neighbours and impoverished servants.
McEvoy plots a path through them all that is at times abrasive and always single-minded in pursuit of the truth. They cooperate to varying degrees with each interview opening further avenues to be explored leaving the detective occasionally despairing of finding the truth. His difficulties are further compounded by having to operate under severe political pressure as well as the looming personal event he must confront.
McEvoy is a very human figure, fallible and conflicted, but also determined and committed to finding justice for various victims. A decent man, trying to do a good job in pretty difficult circumstances.
One of the most interesting elements of the story - and this I think was helped by the reduced financial circumstances the police service found itself in - was just how difficult police work is. Nothing comes easily to McEvoy and his group. They can't just whistle up resources or magical evidence tests that point them in the right direction. They face obstacles from their superiors - under political pressure - and their peers who are jealous of the NBCI for picking up the high profile cases. Suspects don't cooperate and nor do the elements and the investigation therefore requires a great deal of elbow grease and a modicum of luck to succeed.
Partly for that reason, The White Gallows is convincing as fiction and that accounts to a large degree for the success of a thoroughly enjoyable novel.
