Librarian Tim recommends Cross by Ken Bruen (M Bruen, New Books)

When Cross opens, we hardly recognize Jack Taylor. He's sober, relatively lucid, and has been offered an absurd amount of money to sell his Galway apartment. It's not all sunshine and light, though. Cody, the young man Jack has come to see as nearly an adopted son, lies in a coma from a bullet meant for Jack, who feels deep remorse and guilt. Bruen revels in guilt throughout the Taylor novels and Cross is no exception. Irish guilt and Catholic guilt all play a part, with the ghosts of Jack's past haunting him even as he makes plans to leave Galway forever and move to America. Jack's sort-of friend, Ridge, a local policewoman, asks his help in solving a perplexing and brutal murder. A young man has been murdered by crucifixion, a method of death deeply symbolic in Catholic Ireland. Jack stumbles along the first half of the novel, dealing with personal demons before he gets around to attacking the case in question, but Bruen's deeply sympathetic portrayal of Taylor and modern Ireland in general is gripping in its own right. The real action takes place in the final third of the novel, where Jack solves the murder in his own unique way. It wouldn't be a Ken Bruen novel if there weren't a few maddening twists to the tale, this used to frustrate me, but know I know it's just part of his story-telling style. Like John Burdett and James Lee Burke, Bruen is one of the finest and most unflinching crime novelists of today, and this is one of his best stories to date. It is a dark tale not for the faint of heart, but the good stuff never is.

Send comments to: OBPL