Galway Girl: A Jack Taylor Novel (Jack Taylor, #5)

by Ken Bruen

Jack Taylor has never quite been able get his life together, but now he has truly hit rock bottom. Still reeling from a violent family tragedy, Taylor is busy drowning his grief in Jameson and uppers, as usual, when a high-profile officer in the local Garda is murdered. After another Guard is found dead, and then another, Taylor's old colleagues from the force implore him to take on the case. The plot is one big game, and all of the pieces seem to be moving at the behest of one dangerously mysterious team: a trio of young killers with very different styles, but who are united their common desire to take down Jack Taylor. Their ring leader is Jericho, a psychotic girl from Galway who is grieving the loss of her lover, and who will force Jack to confront some personal trauma from his past.

As sharp and sardonic as it is starkly bleak and violent, Galway Girl shows master raconteur Ken Bruen at his best: lyrical, brutal, and ceaselessly suspenseful.

• ISBN13: 9780802147936
• Publish Date: 5 November 2019 (first published 31 October 2019)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Black Cat
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 288
• Language: English

Reviews

[annieb123]

Originally published on my blog: Nonstop Reader.

Galway Girl is the 15th Jack Taylor novel by Ken Bruen. Released 5th Nov 2019 by Mysterious Press, it's 288 pages and available in hardcover, paperback, audio, and ebook formats.

Jack Taylor is a mess. He's insubordinate, mentally ill, a blackout alcoholic, and generally completely fed up with everyone's bullsh*t. Most of Bruen's plots have a ton of disparate threads that come together at the end (usually explosively) and this one is no exception.

This is a beautifully written, often poetic thriller with a palpable Irish noir vibe. The plotting is taut, the setting is amazing and alive in the prose, and the secondary characters (at least the ones who manage to stay alive til the end of the book) are worthwhile and full of, well, character.

Although it's indisputably a really solidly entertaining book, fair warning, the language is rough and it's violent in scary and unpredictable ways. There is nothing cozy here but for lovers of gritty PI procedurals, this is a winner.

The returning characters have developed a lot over the series, and the author doesn't give a lot of back story, so it might be best to pick up some earlier books to get a sense of the characters and their backgrounds.

Amazing book. Five stars.

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.