Church Mouse

“You know you’re reading a good thriller when you start to cast it for the movie before you’ve even finished.” Eithne Hannigan, BOOK REVIEWS, CONNEMARA LIFE magazine, Autumn 2002

You know you’re reading a good thriller when you start to cast it for the movie before you’ve even finished. The plot is as complex as a Grisham novel, with twists and turns that kept me reading all night. It deals with corruption in high places and sinister secret societies and collusion between those who want more power.

The characters are exceptionally well drawn and the dialogue fairly whips along. With the action moving from the elegant rooms of the White House to shootings in New York bars, car chases and mysterious cult rituals, the story catapaults the reader around the United States with confidence. As the plot thickens – as they say! – paranoia battles with genuine anxiety about the U.S. government under threat from those who have a blackmailing agenda.

All the ingredients for a good thriller are here. Owen MacDara is an ex-medical intern who served in Korea, now a millionaire business consultant. His previous history in the army leads him to take up a personal vendetta for the deaths – or are they murders? – of several of his former army buddies. His soulmate is the beautiful daughter of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff upon whom MacDara had operated, in strictest confidentiality, in Korea. The subplots interweave as the protagonists’ lives become affected by seemingly unrelated killings. Only MacDara begins to sense a more wide-ranging conspiracy.

The details about the internal workings of the U.S. President’s office and the machinations of those ‘who would be king’ are neatly plotted, with enough kidnappings, torture and sex to satisfy any connoisseur of the thriller genre.

It’s pacey and exciting and filmic in its descriptions, and is an impressive first novel.

Definitely a gripping read for these long winter evenings ………..

Eithne Hannigan holds an M.A. (hons.) in English and Law from King’s College, Cambridge. She worked as an actor, musician and writer with Liverpool Everyman, Liverpool Playhouse, National Theatre and Donmar Warehouse in London. She then joined the BBC to present Playschool and, from 1987 to 1990, she presented her own show, Dot. Today she tours Ireland with her own band, Some Like It Hot. She has played at all the prestigious Jazz and Blues festivals both in Ireland and Britain, including Edinburgh and Glastonbury. Television appearances include The Late Late Show and Nighthawks.

***********************************************************************

“Here comes Pat Mullan with a thriller that will do exactly that…thrill you!” Ken Bruen

Just when I’d lost faith in thrillers and reckoned I’d exhausted the genre, even Jack Higgins seemed to have tired of the formula, along comes a humdinger of a book to revive my joy in the art of thriller writing. Somehow it seems to be accepted that this discipline is not so difficult…..whoa, is that ever a misconception. When was the last time you were on the edge of your chair or stayed up way too late as a plot wouldn’t let you go? Here is the book to satisfy all of the above.

Here comes Pat Mullan with a thriller that will do exactly that…thrill you. From the amazing opening, I defy you not to swallow this in one huge gulp and pray like me that his sequel will be soon. With an absolute cracker of a hero and soaring writing, the story is mesmerising, you just can’t turn the pages fast enough.

Another misconception is that thrillers are not well written. Pat Mullan knocks that notion right out of the water. That he is a poet is immediately evident and when you think of that