“Declan Burke is his own genre. The Lammisters dazzles, beguiles and transcends. Virtuoso from start to finish.” – Eoin McNamee “This bourbon-smooth riot of jazz-age excess, high satire and Wodehouse flamboyance is a pitch-perfect bullseye of comic brilliance.” – Irish Independent Books of the Year 2019 “This rapid-fire novel deserves a place on any bookshelf that grants asylum to PG Wodehouse, Flann O’Brien or Kyril Bonfiglioli.” – Eoin Colfer, Guardian Best Books of the Year 2019 “The funniest book of the year.” – Sunday Independent “Declan Burke is one funny bastard. The Lammisters ... conducts a forensic analysis on the anatomy of a story.” – Liz Nugent “Burke’s exuberant prose takes centre stage … He plays with language like a jazz soloist stretching the boundaries of musical theory.” – Totally Dublin “A mega-meta smorgasbord of inventive language ... linguistic verve not just on every page but every line.Irish Times “Above all, The Lammisters gives the impression of a writer enjoying himself. And so, dear reader, should you.” – Sunday Times “A triumph of absurdity, which burlesques the literary canon from Shakespeare, Pope and Austen to Flann O’Brien … The Lammisters is very clever indeed.” – The Guardian

Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Lost Classics # 113: The Polling of the Dead by John M. Kelly

"But you know damned well who will be the gainers in the end. Not the politicians like myself, who have to pike the dung. The real winners will be the suffering Irish people. For once." A timely number, given that the Irish nation is charging off to the polls to vote early and often tomorrow, John M. Kelly's (right) The Polling of the Dead (1993) is a cracking thriller a la Ross Macdonald which incorporates ex-Nazi fugitives from justice as part of its backstory. Set in 1960s Dublin, it's a first-person narration by a political Mr Fixit, Redmond Byrne, who goes in search of answers when his friend and Opposition candidate, Daithi Flood, is found dead at the bottom of a rubbish chute in the run-up to polling day. Beautifully written - as you might expect from a man who also wrote A Short History of Western Legal Theory (OUP) and the standard work on the Irish Constitution - it also showcases a Sahara-dry wit and an appreciation of Chandler, Macdonald et al, all delivered in a salty Irish vernacular. Discovered after his untimely death in 1991, this was the former Cabinet Minister and Parliamentary Secretary to the Taoiseach's second venture into crime fiction (he published Matters of Honour (1964) as 'John Boyle'), and deserves an immediate reprint. Over to you, publishing folk ...

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