Purgatory

By Ken Bruen

An Irish ex-cop is lured into a violent game by a vengeful killer in this “excellent” crime novel by an Edgar Award finalist (Publishers Weekly, starred review).
 
Former cop Jack Taylor is recovering from mental and physical wounds, as well as from addictions to a variety of substances. But this fragile existence is threatened when a vigilante begins targeting the scum of Galway, signing mysterious notes with the moniker “C33.” The murderer addresses these cryptic letters to Jack, trying to goad him into joining the violent spree.

While Jack tries to unravel the mystery and motives of this demented killer, he’s also brought into the fold of an enigmatic tech billionaire who has been buying up massive amounts of property in Galway, seemingly in the hopes of offering this downtrodden city a better future. Yet if Jack has learned one thing living in Ireland, it's that people who outwardly claim to be on the side of righteousness are likely harboring far more nefarious motives beneath the surface.

With the help of his friends, a former drug dealer-turned-zen master and a dogged police sergeant, Jack is determined to track down C33, even if it jeopardizes his livelihood, his friends, and the remaining shreds of his sanity…
 
“Noir fans will find what they love here.”—Booklist (starred review)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Integrated Media
• Release date: Nov 4, 2013
• ISBN: 9780802193964

Ken Bruen

Ken Bruen is one of the most prominent Irish crime writers of the last two decades. He received a doctorate in metaphysics, taught English in South Africa, and then became a crime novelist. He is the recipient of two Barry Awards, two Shamus Awards and has twice been a finalist for the Edgar Award. He lives in Galway, Ireland.

Book preview

PURGATORY

A Jack Taylor Novel

Ken Bruen

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The Mysterious Press

an imprint of Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

New York

Copyright © 2013 by Ken Bruen

Jacket design by Marc Cohen/MJCdesign; Jacket photographs shot glass © Masterfile; paper © jupiterimages/Getty

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. Scanning, uploading, and electronic distribution of this book or the facilitation of such without the permission of the publisher is prohibited. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated. Any member of educational institutions wishing to photocopy part or all of the work for classroom use, or anthology, should send inquiries to Grove/Atlantic, Inc., 154 West 14th Street, New York, NY 10011 or [e-mail].

Published simultaneously in Canada

Printed in the United States of America

eBook ISBN: 978-0-8021-9396-4

The Mysterious Press

an imprint of Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

154 West 14th Street

New York, NY 10011

Distributed by Publishers Group West

www.groveatlantic.com

Disclaimer:

Purgatory is a work of fiction. While the real-life crimes referred to in the novel actually occurred, their chronology has been condensed in order to maintain a greater level of suspense and continuity in the actions of the characters in the story, who are entirely fictional.

For

Michael and Ollie Crowe

Derek Hynes

Part 1

The Men

The skateboarders had that peculiar blend of Irish self-­consciousness, dumb persistence. The unusually good weather in early January had led to a makeshift ramp that was ambitiously steep and high. The Council would have removed this but had its hands full with the Occupiers, who had a large tent perched to the left side of Eyre Square.

Too, the skateboarders kept the locals from lynching the Council over various charges.

Water

Refuse

Home

And just about damn everything else.

Three Guards were deemed sufficient to watch the growing crowd for what was rumored to be a spectacular attempt.

A double flip in midair from Joseph, a sixteen-year-old whiz flier from Tuam. He was small. Undistinguished, with the revamped grunge look that owed more to the new poverty than to fashion. Quiet seeped as he took his run at the ramp. A slight ah from the crowd as he accelerated faster than they’d expected, then he was airborne, high above the ramp, left the board, was in mid-turn when the single shot rang out.

He seemed to hang for a moment, the top right side of his brain scattering in a slow mist, then a loud scream from the crowd as his body hurled to the concrete.

Two people were hurt in the panic.

A skater had the presence of mind to steal the almost-famous board.

1

Your crazy daughter is on our short list.

There’s nothing wrong with her.

She talks to people who aren’t there.

No she doesn’t, she only listens.

—Carol O’Connell, author of The Chalk Girl

My life seemed to have reached a time of calm. New home, new(ish) habits, new people.

Prize bonds.

Who knew?

Who the fuck knew?

A staple of my father’s generation. People bought them for their family’s future. The Lotto and lotteries of every ilk came down the greed pike and these forgotten bonds languished in drawers or the pages of family Bibles never opened.

I had, owing to a threat to my father’s reputation, rummaged among his few possessions.

Kept in a Lyons Tea chest, his few papers scorched my heart. A certificate of loyalty to the Knights of Columbanus, an Inter-Counties semifinal medal in hurling, now as tarnished as the country. A fade to faded picture of the family at

Get this

The fucking beach.

Not exactly a Californian scene. Didn’t evoke a Beach Boys theme.

No.

My parents, in their street clothes, with a summer concession of my father’s, sleeves rolled up. My mother was wearing what might have then been called

A summer frock.

Save they didn’t do seasonal.

She wore the same item in winter, with a cardigan added. She did have her one habitual trait.

The bitterness.

Leaking from her down-turned mouth to every resentful fiber of her being. I was maybe eight in the photo, an ugly child who grew to embrace ugliness as a birthright. Tellingly, my father’s hands were on my shoulders, my mother’s were folded in that

What are you looking at?

Pose she perfected every day of her miserable life.

My mother wasn’t a simple bitch.

She was more evolved, a cunning sociopath who hated the world under the guise of piety.

Dead for years now, so did I finally, Oprah-like, come to understand and, yes, alleluia,

Forgive?

Yeah, like fuck.

And, oh my God, she would spin in her grave to know those prize bonds were sitting there. There may not be justice but there is sure some cosmic twisted karma. Took a while for the bonds to be processed but, when they were, I was stunned.

Cash.

Lots of it.

So.

I stopped drinking.

How weird is that? When I couldn’t afford it on any level, I went at it like a famished greyhound. Now, I quit?

Go figure.

Three months in, I was doing okay, not gasping, hanging in there and feeling a whole lot healthier. I’d been down this road so many times, but something had altered. My last case, I literally lost two fingers, and witnessed some events that shadowed me in a new way. I finally figured out booze wasn’t easing my torture but fine-tuning it. Would it last? Who knew?

I was sitting in Garavan’s, just off Shop Street. It still resembled the old pubs: an Irish barman, snug, no bouncers, decent slow-pulled pints, and memories of the bearable kind. Pat, a middle-aged guy, was tending the pumps, brought me a black coffee, glass of sparkling water. He was off the booze his own self, so no gibes. Said,

I’m off the cigs.

He was an old-school smoker, mainlined nicotine. I said the usual hollow things, ended with,

Did you use the patches?

Fear,

He said.

Whether of health, economics, his wife, I didn’t push.

Life needs a touch of mystery and not everything requires an answer.

2

Some people, I saw, had drowned right away. And some people were drowning in slow motion, drowning a little bit at a time, and would be drowning for years. And some people, like Mick, had always been drowning. They just didn’t know what to call it until now.

—Sara Gran, The City of the Dead

Purgatory is the pit stop en route to hell.

The woman sat opposite me, didn’t ask, just sat. This used to happen a lot. People believing I had some inside track for finding things, people, solutions, and maybe answers. I’d found some answers, over the years, and they were always the wrong ones. Or right but for the wrong reasons. I’d given it up with the booze, the cigs, the Xanax.

Before she could speak, I said,

No.

Knocked her back.

Her mouth made a small O of surprise. I knew the gig.

The touching photo.

Some heart-kicking story.

Her son/brother/husband

Missing

Was a great/caring/lovable

Individual

And

Could I find him, what happened to him?

The whole usual awful parade of misery.

She tried,

But, they said, you care.

I said,

I don’t.

And I didn’t.

Not no more.

Sorry.

My new home was a steal.

Galway, in the boom years, the most sought-after location for housing in the country. Plus the most expensive. Now the new austerity, the bankruptcy, and you couldn’t give away property. I rented a two-bedroom, ground-floor, bright, open apartment in Merchants Road, not a spit from the Garda station.

Flat-screen TV, modern kitchen for all the cooking I’d never do. Large pine bookcase. I’d given Vinny a shout at Charlie Byrne’s bookshop and he’d stacked the shelves. He knew my books, sometimes, even knew me. Plus, he’d handed me an envelope, said,

It was left in the shop for you.

No, he hadn’t seen who dropped it off.

My name on a deep blue envelope, almost the color of a Guard’s tunic. Inside

A photo of a young man, on a skateboard, high in the air, looking like an eagle against the sky. Then a piece from The Galway Advertiser which read

. . . verdict due on January 10th in vicious rape case. Tim Rourke, accused in the brutal rape and battery of two young girls, is due in court for the verdict. Controversy has surrounded the case since it was revealed the Guards had not followed procedure in obtaining the evidence.

There was more, about this being the latest high-profile case likely to be thrown out over some technicality. And still

The bankers

Developers

Clergy

Continued to fuck us over every way they could.

A single piece of notepaper had this printed on it

You want to take this one? Your turn, Jack.

Signed

C33.

3

Right, she thought, I’m just having a little attack of metaphysics.

—Fred Vargas, The Chalk Circle Man

Philosophy is for the man of private means.

Stewart was more a reluctant ally than a friend. A former yuppie dope dealer, he’d been sent to jail for six years, hard full sentence. I’d solved the murder of his sister; he felt an enduring debt since. After his release, he’d reinvented himself as a Zen-spouting entrepreneur. And seemed to make shitloads of cash. Even in the depths of the current bleak economy. We’d been thrown together on numerous cases and he’d developed a strong friendship with my other ally.

Ridge.

Sergeant Ní Iomaire.

A gay Guard, married to a bollix. She was currently out of the marriage but moving up the ranks, slowly, in the all-male hierarchy of the police. They seemed to believe I was redeemable.

Not yet.

Stewart was sitting in the lobby of the Meryck Hotel. It fed his posh aspirations and served herbal tea. A crime in any venue. Wearing an Armani suit, he sat at ease, like a cat with breeding. I was drinking black coffee, bitter as my heart. I showed him the note, article, photo I’d received. He gave his full focus. Said,

Let me check on this photo. It looks familiar.

Then he read aloud the message, which was

Your turn, Jack.

Looked at me, asked,

What do you figure?

I told the truth.

No idea.

He pushed.

And?

And . . . nothing. I don’t care.

He let out a small sigh, stole a glance at my mutilated hand. I wore a glove, gave the appearance of all the fingers. He pushed his tea aside, made a gesture with his head.

Annoyance?

Asked,

Why are you showing it to me then?

You see, Stewart, you have the tendency to want to know the answer to . . . Jesus, everything. I thought this might keep you off the streets.

He didn’t rise to the bait, asked,

"If I work it out, am I to tell you, am I to report back?"

I said,

Tell Ridge. She might give a fuck.

He scanned the note again, asked,

C33?

And before I could take a shot, he said,

Right, you don’t give a toss.

I was moving fast away, despite my limp, acting up less these days, when Stewart shouted,

What about that dude Reardon?

Let him shout

Bí cúramach!

Indeed.

The Reardon Riddle?

Talk of the town. One of the rarities, a dot-com billionaire who’d survived the current global meltdown, had come to Galway, set up headquarters, and, according to rumor, was going to save the city. Not yet forty, the guy was allegedly a blend of Steve Jobs, Gandhi, and Putin. Didn’t hurt he looked more like a roadie than a star, gave that edge vibe.

When priests had to disguise their clerical collars owing to public ire, it helped that this whiz kid didn’t look like the other loathed species, bankers.

His trademark jeans, trainers, were more Armani than Penney’s but, hey, who was judging?

Was he too good to be true?

We were about to find out. But the buzz was all good thus far. I mean, fuck, he’d even said he’d like to save Galway United. On the smart board, this was cute twice over. Swear to God, our previous manager’s financial adviser had been Nick Leeson! Yeah, the same fella who took Barings Bank for a scorching hike.

When I was a child, the nearest family we had to royalty were the Hunters. They made prams—I shit thee not—but had the Anglo-Irish gig down. Owned a large, get this, White Mansion, at the rear of Galway. They were steady employers, reputed to be decent folk, i.e., they’d actually greet a person, if sparingly.

Like our economy, belief, decency, they were in the wind.

Reardon had bought their old home and extensive rebuilding, renovations were under way.

See, employment right there.

I’d watched a rare interview he’d given. Long, tangled,

Dude, just got out of the shower . . .

Hair.

The aforementioned jeans and a sweatshirt that was just faded enough to read,

Pogues . . . Rule.

This guy had his shit down.

He’d given one of those rambling monologues, ablaze with sound bites, signifying nothing. But he had a way of doling out this crap, you could believe it made some sense. His accent was a hybrid of surfer dude, Michael Flatley version of Irish brogue, geek.

Somewhere in this mess, he’d been asked about his single status.

He . . . winked . . . fucking winked, went coy about hoping to meet an Irish girl. That’s when I threw up.

Ridge phoned me as I was reading about the former hangman, Albert Pierrepoint. The state had released papers previously sealed from the public and all sorts of weird, startling data were flooding the news. Pierrepoint had offered to hang two people with the deal,

Ten pound for the first and I’ll do the nephew for half price.

Jesus.

The forerunner of all those offers,

Buy one, get one free.

Ridge asked,

Am I interrupting something?

Tales of the hangman.

A pause.

The question hovered,

Are you drinking?

But it passed and she asked,

Will you help me out?

Uh-oh

As they say in literary novels,

No good would have come of it.

Ridge had married Anthony Hemple, an upper-class Anglo-Irish bollix. He wanted a mother for his daughter, she wanted juice for promotion to sergeant. They were

Reviews for Purgatory

[kerns222 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Bruen has matured and does more than shovel despondent wretchedness at you as he ages Taylor (complete with hearing aid). Many lit, music, contemporary references, murders, binges, and Dublin on its last legs, but hope is not completely lost as in the earlier books. I need a star on the horizon to keep me going in life, and in books. Maybe it's just me, but I don't want a crapworld rubbed in my face all the time. Sometimes that seems to be Bruen's goal.

[jbarringer-2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a Jack Taylor novel, and I enjoyed the tv show on netflix, so I was looking forward to trying out some of the novels. While some of Bruen's writing style bugs me, overall I enjoyed this one. I wish the TV show included a homosexual female cop like the one Taylor relies on in this book. Perhaps such inclusiveness would have hurt ratings, especially in more conservative parts of Ireland, but I like the dynamics in this book with such a character involved.

[beamis12 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Jack Taylor is one of the most original characters in fiction. He is an ex-guard, a crusty and dark and cynical individual, a good friend to a few, bad news to those who cross him or the ones he loves, he loves to read and a friend keeps his apartment stocked with novels. Though he once had every bad habit known to man, in this novel he has quit drinking his beloved Jameson's, in fact he has quit drinking period, he has quit smoking and other bad habits that threatened to shorten his life. He has quit taking cases, but of course, someone close to him gets him involved. Fate has other plans for him. Not everyone will like Bruen's staccato style of writing, his witty observations and one-liners, his irreverence but those of us who do hope this author keeps writing these novels for a long time. In fact I liked one of his lines so much I just have to repeat it, Jack Taylor is a recovering Catholic. She laughed, Jesus wept.ARC from publisher.

[brokenangelkisses · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I like narratives with a distinctive voice. That said, I find narrators with a truly distinctive voice can take a bit of getting used to. My first perusal of the opening pages of Ken Bruen's 'Purgatory' didn't inspire me to read further and I let most of a month slip by, reading other things, until the deadline presented by my crime reading group came sharply into focus.== What's it about? ==Someone calling themselves C33 is killing crooks in Galway. Ex-guard Jack Taylor isn't interested in getting involved, despite receiving personal notes from the killer suggesting he might like to 'play'. Jack's friend, Stewart, is interested and courting danger. Will Jack help him solve the case?Meanwhile, Reardon, a billionaire determined to buy up Galway, is intent on turning Jack into his pet, and Jack begins a relationship with Kelly, Reardon's assistant. But what do these two really want with Jack Taylor?==What's it like? ==Unsurprisingly, considering its positioning as noir fiction, the tone and content is dark, miserable and violent. Bruen isn't afraid to maim and / or kill off his characters and those who survive seem to mostly spend their time drinking and drugging themselves into oblivion. Jack in particular begins the book 'on the wagon', but it isn't long before he's stumbling along beside it.This is the tenth book in Bruen's 'Jack Taylor' series so fans will doubtless be used to their anti-hero's rather sweary nature and ability to survive anything the city's mad men and semi-corrupt cops can throw at him. In a previous outing he has evidently lost some fingers and his desire to be a PI - his ostensible trade. In fact, it is not until page 253 of 283 that Jack notes laconically: 'Finally did a detective thing'. Clearly, Bruen recognises that his character's role up to this point has been more passive drunk than active investigator.This hint of metafictionality grows throughout 'Purgatory'. Each short chapter is prefaced with one or two quotations, taken from literature, Irish sayings and songs, celebrities and, um, characters from this book. In the final chapters, Jack, our first-person narrator, begins to refer to old cases by the names of earlier books in the series. Somehow this feels quite appropriate in a story already littered with cultural references: Jack's life seems to partly consist of watching a string of drama series that were axed after one or two seasons; Kelly has a thing for Oscar Wilde; and these two characters visit a bookshop that happens to have a display of noir fiction in the window. Perhaps Jack's cultural engagement is meant to show the reader that, despite his professed skill with the hurley, he is redeemable.The frequent references to political and sporting events root this novel firmly in a particular time period which feels relevant now but will mean it dates quite quickly. Given Bruen's success and that of the hit TV series based on this character, I doubt that's a concern. There is also a very strong sense of place, though not necessarily a place you'd want to live in. Galway is vividly rendered through its population: the Guards, the drunks, the bartenders and baristas who adopt new customs that horrify Jack.Bruen writing as Jack Taylor adopts an abrupt style which is somewhat lacking in verbs. This is a typical extract:Before she could speak, I said'No.'Knocked her back.Her mouth made a small O of surprise. I knew the gig.The touching photo.Some heart-kicking story.Her son/daughter/husbandmissingwas a great/caring/loveable individual,andcould I find them, what happened to them?The whole usual awful parade of misery.It took maybe fifty pages for me to acclimatise to this style, which isn't as long as it sounds; if all the sentences in this book were bundled into regular sized paragraphs, the book itself would be at least two thirds shorter. Once I had adapted, Jack's distinctive voice and dark humour were a good enough reason to keep reading, despite a rather slim plot.As a hard-boiled anti-hero, Jack succeeds brilliantly. He is persistently blind to his friends' predicaments, though usually at least partly responsible, always ready to sink into alcohol and / or narcotics induced oblivion, and cavalierly unconcerned about his own welfare. Flashes of morality twinkle at readers, signalling a decent man at heart, but I hope in future additions to these series he might actually, y'know, actively attempt to solve a crime or two. (In fairness, he does solve this one, though it's largely by accident.)The ending is a little frustrating as Bruen throws in a last minute shock, evidently designed to bait the hook for book eleven. Yawn. Presumably regular readers will now be clamouring to know the next publication date, but I have always found such last-second dramas off-putting and thought its inclusion here was a bit of a shame. Doesn't Bruen trust his readers to seek out the next instalment?== Final thoughts ==I didn't feel at any disadvantage for not having read (or watched) the series previously, and clearly Bruen didn't expect me to experience any difficulties; there are no recaps at all. Recurring characters are introduced very briefly and, aside from a few references to previous history, nothing from previous books intrides into the action of this one. I found this quite refreshing actually, as most series require the reader to develop at least a rudimentary understanding of several recurring characters and key relationships. Jack's nature ensures this isn't necessary!Chapters are very short - just a few pages long - which makes this easy to read. The overall book is clearly structured with a prologue and kind-of epilogue bookending the action. I felt all the quotations were rather unnecessary, but if you like exercising your mind by considering how they fit in with the plot etc. then you'll have plenty of opportunities to enjoy doing just that.Overall, this is a good example of the noir genre with sufficient world-weary gone-slightly-bad-and-mad-ex-upholder-of-the-law antics to keep readers interested. The £12.99 RRP (for a paperback?!) seems a tad expensive for something I'm unlikely to read more than once, but it may be worth the cost for fans who want to collect the series.Read this if:- you enjoy reading about hardboiled, world-weary (not quite) detectives in noir narratives;- you enjoy reading novels written in a very distinctive voice;- you enjoy reading books with a strong sense of time and place, especially contemporary time and place.Avoid this if:- you dislike reading a lot of swearing or about a lot of drinking and drug abuse;- you like crime stories with a strong sense of plot, clues, red herrings...typical crime stuff;- you like conventional narratives and prefer reading about heroes, not anti-heroes.

[ahs7wolfy · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Jack Taylor is in a relatively calm place. Recovering from events of the previous book he’s off the drink and drugs and he’s even given up smoking. Those that have spent time with Jack previously will know that things are about to change and not for the better. This 10th instalment in the series sees the eponymous hero receiving notes from a vigilante killer who wants Jack to join in on the fun. But the notes find Jack in a can’t be bothered kind of mood, even telling a potential client “No.” before she even opened her mouth. So the vigilante moves on to Stewart, Jack’s sole remaining true friend, and start sending notes to him instead while still trying to get Jack involved. Meanwhile, there’s a new player in town, Reardon is looking to buy up all of Galway and also takes an interest in Jack and this introduces him to Kelly, Reardon’s PA, the wrong sort of woman that Jack always seems to get involved with. So who is the vigilante known as C33 and why are they determined to get Jack involved?This is a brutal series and this book may be the worst so far but only if you’ve been following along with Jack’s story to date. Don’t ever become friends with Jack Taylor, don’t fall for him and don’t even do a job for him. In fact, don’t even talk to him if you know what’s good for you. Best stay away altogether. The darkness that surrounds Jack is still an ever present as is his caustic put-downs, often at the expense of those closest to him. Lots more recommendations on the book front when Jack’s bookshelves are once again filled by his local dealer. This time around he’s on a women crime-writers kick. He’s also trying to increase my to watch list as well when he re-organises his DVD shelves.Another fine entry into an excellent series which I would urge you not to be the first one you pick up otherwise you might not read another Ken Bruen book again.