Headbanger: A Novel

by Hugo Hamilton

In a cinema verite style, Hugo Hamilton decimates cliches of cops and robbers with doses of smoldering Irish sectarianism and the realities of a seedy, postindustrial Dublin. “Coyne is a majestic creation.... If Flann O’Brien’s lunatic Professor De Selby had genetically engineered a cross between the novels of Raymond Chandler and those of Patrick McCabe, this is what the progeny might well have looked like.” — The Times (London)

230 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Hugo Hamilton is an Irish writer.

Hamilton's mother was a German who travelled to Ireland in 1949 for a pilgrimage, married an Irishman, and settled in the country. His father was a militant nationalist who insisted that his children should speak only German or Irish, but not English, a prohibition the young Hugo resisted inwardly. "The prohibition against English made me see that language as a challenge. Even as a child I spoke to the walls in English and secretly rehearsed dialogue I heard outside," he wrote later.

As a consequence of this, he grew up with three languages - English, Irish and German - and a sense of never really belonging to any: "There were no other children like me, no ethnic groups that I could attach myself to".

Hamilton became a journalist, and then a writer of short stories and novels. His first three novels were set in Central Europe. Then came Headbanger (1996), a darkly comic crime novel set in Dublin and featuring detective Pat Coyne. A sequel, Sad Bastard, followed in 1998.

Following a year spent in Berlin on a cultural scholarship, he completed his memoir of childhood, The Speckled People (2003), which went on to achieve widespread international acclaim. Telling the story through the eyes of his childhood self, it painfully evoked the struggle to make sense of a bizarre adult world. It "triumphantly avoids the Angela's Ashes style of sentimental nostalgia and victim claims," wrote Hermione Lee in the The Guardian . "The cumulative effect is to elevate an act of scrupulous remembering into a work of art," commented James Lasdun in the New York Times. The story is picked up in the 2006 volume, The Sailor in the Wardrobe.

In May 2007, German publisher Luchterhand published Die redselige Insel (The Talkative Island), in which Hamilton retraced the journey Heinrich Böll made in Ireland that was to be the basis of his bestselling book Irisches Tagebuch (Irish Journal) in 1957. Hamilton's most recent novel, Disguise was published on June 6, 2008.

Hugo Hamilton lives in Dublin, Ireland.

Source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Ham...

Reviews

[Robert]

Irish crime novel featuring a wild and delusional cop protagonist who goes on a vigilante streak against a Dublin mobster. It's an entertaining read flavored with Hamilton's vivid (and scathing) depiction of Irish culture/society in the '90s.

Coyne, the anti-hero cop, is a very interesting character, an overreaching lughead who's probably watched way too many action movies. Hamilton writes that Coyne sees himself as always performing for an audience, something that's both narcissistic and a bit relatable (we're all at some level the center of our own universes). Coyne is a Travis Bickle type who has lost faith in the system and wants to be the hero who rectifies things, despite not really being qualified (or ethically-grounded) to carry that mantle.

The book's worth reading simply as an examination of the Coyne character. There are plots and subplots and other crime novel elements that aren't all that special. But there's very obviously something bigger than all that going on between the covers, and it's both intriguing and provocative.

[Rob Kitchin]

Headbanger is an in-depth character study of a cop teetering on the edge of madness, seemingly determined to careen down into its depths regardless of its consequences. Hamilton is good at capturing the small details of life, the nuances and foibles of folk and the spaces they inhabit. The characters, their relationships, and the sense of 1990s Dublin are well penned, and I thought the ending was very nicely done. Despite his eccentricities, Coyne and his work and home life are credible, and it’s difficult not to build up an empathy for a troubled soul. For my taste the book is too much of a character study; I prefer more action and dialogue and less introspection. What is refreshing, however, is the focus on an ordinary cop, someone who hasn’t gained rank or a position in an elite squad of some kind. Overall, an enjoyable slice of Dublin noir.

[Donny Wankan]

I tried and failed with this one. Maybe I'm just not in the right mood, but there were too many little details that got on my nerves for me to enjoy this book.
It will be fun for a lot of readers. As far as I read, I got a cynical, slightly nutty Irish cop on a mission to clean up the world and lacking any ethical restraint or concern for personal safety, with a little bit of context as a container. A criminal of some sort, a wife to the main character who's a perfect spouse and parent but deep inside is an artistic genius, and a police chief trying desperately to control the protagonist. And this is the first part of what bothered me about the book.
It's all so absurdly cliche. Every new detail feels like a summary point from every "rogue cop" film and novel I've ever experienced.
This wouldn't be too bad if the writing was better, but it feels like it was written by an adolescent who's just discovered the magic of metaphor. Each "clever" comparison is either irrational or corny as all getout, and if it wasn't bad enough that the metaphors were poorly chosen, Hamilton spends at least a paragraph if not two or three drawing them out, further explanation just making it ever more clear how ridiculous they are.
Can I get a chapter, Hamilton? The book is one long string of alternate perspective vignettes, which does break up the flow into tiny bite sized pieces, but at about 30 pages, I knew I wouldn't make it when I'd spent almost as much time flipping through to see if I could find the first actual chapter end as I'd spent reading the book.
And to top it off, he thinks he's Cormac McCarthy and leaves out quotation marks, and while I don't mind cleverly done nonstandard usage and grammar, only very good writers should be allowed to get away with something as glaring as no quotations on dialog. This may be a fun read, for fans of cliche cop fiction, but it's not even close to being the kind of masterpiece that gets to break fundamental rules without making itself look even more amateurish.
And that word encapsulates my impression of this book. I tried to give it a bit more time beyond when it had already begun to get on my nerves because I'd seen some summary commentary about the protagonist going crazy, and I thought maybe it would redeem its own weaknesses as symptoms of his craziness, but I lost patience.
To be fair, I may not have given it enough time, but I feel like from what I've read already, I know exactly what's going to happen, and I have no interest in such a pat, predictable story, especially one poorly written.

[Terry]

I can’t quite remember what source promoted Hugo Hamilton, but since I’m heading to Ireland this year, I thought I’d give him a try. He truly is a gifted writer; and his Irish sense of humor is as dark and dirty as they come. This novel truly was on a slow burn, there was a constant sense that something bad was going to happen. I’m not quite sure why I’m leaving this at a 3-star as I did enjoy the book, so maybe it’s the genera – rather “Dirty Harry-ish.” I’m going to read “Sad Bastard” and see where things go from there.

[Mike Heenan]

Once you get into the writing style this is a good read. Scatter gun comments with an Irish twist makes for very enjoyable reading.

[Temperandrea]

«In poche parole, il mondo è fottuto». L’eroico e solerte agente Pat Coyne, soprannominato Mister Suicidio per via di uno sprezzo del pericolo alla Joe Swanson de I Griffin, si sveglia un mattino accorgendosi di non capirci più nulla della vita della metropoli, della sua Dublino, dell’Irlanda e in generale del mondo “civilizzato”. Non c’è discorso dell’agente Coyne – appassionato di antropologia e di ecologia, oltre che di precisione linguistica e grammaticale – che non sfoci in una dissertazione sul consumismo o sull’inquinamento. Più precisamente, con lui tutto culmina con la fine del mondo. E con l’idea fissa di un diluvio che sommergerà l’Irlanda...
Leggi il resto della mia recensione qui:
http://www.raccontopostmoderno.com/20...

[Stephen Caul]

If you read this review hopefully it will save you time, save you time of reading what I can only describe as one of the worst books I have ever read. The characters are just one dimensional, the plot you could only find if you had a very powerful magnifying glass and a narrative that made me feel embarrassed for the writer. There is no development of the characters to whom you can't relate.

If you see this book just leave it be.

[Mebhe]

Excellent. Je me rappelle que je me cachais derrière mon livre dans le train pour cacher mon fou rire... :) Parce que c'est vraiment un livre à mourir de rire ! J'adore l'humour de Hugo Hamilton.