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Inspector Matt Minogue #5
The Good Life
Dublin’s canal gives up the body of a prostitute and reveals a drug underworld.
Dublin’s Grand Canal used to be a place for young lovers to take a romantic stroll. Now it’s a prime spot for drug deals and prostitution. The water which used to harbour elegant swans now washes up syringes and dead bodies. Mary Mullen is found battered and her body dumped callously, jammed against a canal lock. All she wanted was some of ‘the good life’, but after hooking up with the notorious Egan brothers, things began to spiral out of control.
In his efforts to solve Mary’s murder, Minogue is plunged into the depths of Dublin’s underworld. It’s a world of drug trafficking, pornography and prostitution. Every path Minogue follows seems to lead back to the Egans, whose organized crime family is already under surveillance by a joint police task force. The Gardai keep receiving frantic phone calls from a friend of Mary. Liam Hickey, a petty thief and sometime drug user, knows something but he’s terrified both of the Gardai and the Egans and wants to stay on the run. The investigation is soon complicated by a problem with Minogue’s new partner on the Squad. Tommy Malone, a dyed-in-the-wool Dubliner, has a twin brother: Terry, complete with his drug addiction, is about to be released from prison, and he’s heading straight into the Egan’s deadly web.
Dublin’s Grand Canal used to be a place for young lovers to take a romantic stroll. Now it’s a prime spot for drug deals and prostitution. The water which used to harbour elegant swans now washes up syringes and dead bodies. Mary Mullen is found battered and her body dumped callously, jammed against a canal lock. All she wanted was some of ‘the good life’, but after hooking up with the notorious Egan brothers, things began to spiral out of control.
In his efforts to solve Mary’s murder, Minogue is plunged into the depths of Dublin’s underworld. It’s a world of drug trafficking, pornography and prostitution. Every path Minogue follows seems to lead back to the Egans, whose organized crime family is already under surveillance by a joint police task force. The Gardai keep receiving frantic phone calls from a friend of Mary. Liam Hickey, a petty thief and sometime drug user, knows something but he’s terrified both of the Gardai and the Egans and wants to stay on the run. The investigation is soon complicated by a problem with Minogue’s new partner on the Squad. Tommy Malone, a dyed-in-the-wool Dubliner, has a twin brother: Terry, complete with his drug addiction, is about to be released from prison, and he’s heading straight into the Egan’s deadly web.
350 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1994
4 people are currently reading
46 people want to read
About the author
John Brady
56 books15 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
John Brady was born in Dublin, the fictional setting of his acclaimed series of Matt Minogue mystery novels. Brady immigrated to Canada at the age of 20, and has worked as a bank official, RCMP clerical officer and teacher. His seventh Minogue novel, Wonderland, taps into Dublin’s exploding economy and its aftershocks at every level of society. He lives in Toronto. He won the Arthur Ellis Award to the First Best Novel in 1989 for A Stone of the Heart.
Series:
* Inspector Matt Minogue
John Brady was born in Dublin, the fictional setting of his acclaimed series of Matt Minogue mystery novels. Brady immigrated to Canada at the age of 20, and has worked as a bank official, RCMP clerical officer and teacher. His seventh Minogue novel, Wonderland, taps into Dublin’s exploding economy and its aftershocks at every level of society. He lives in Toronto. He won the Arthur Ellis Award to the First Best Novel in 1989 for A Stone of the Heart.
Series:
* Inspector Matt Minogue
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
August 19, 2023
In a class by himself!
January 19, 2014
Inspector Minogues and his boss no longer engage in Irish banter. They attack. The fun of Kaddish is missing. The detectives' back and forth is no longer a spectator sport for us readers, it is simply tiring.
Also, Brady pulls one on you. Near the end, he hides important decisions, something he does not do in earlier chapters. So the ending sneaks up on you if you are not careful.
Finally the twin caper seemed like a long-planned, well-drained twist. As though, the plot were in the drivers seat. You expect the characters and their Irish rants to drive Brady's books. At least I do.
But I liked it. The characters all lived and I look forward to my next murder with Brady.
Also, Brady pulls one on you. Near the end, he hides important decisions, something he does not do in earlier chapters. So the ending sneaks up on you if you are not careful.
Finally the twin caper seemed like a long-planned, well-drained twist. As though, the plot were in the drivers seat. You expect the characters and their Irish rants to drive Brady's books. At least I do.
But I liked it. The characters all lived and I look forward to my next murder with Brady.
January 24, 2015
The plot is very murky and somewhat muddy in its unracelling. In short, a young woman is founded murdered by the side of a canal in Dublin and our Irish police (Garda) detective finally gets to the bottom of it. The search takes us through Dublin's underside with gangs and the higher-ups who run prostitution rings and commit murders.
July 16, 2009
see otehr Brady Reviews
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November 10, 2012more, please--
August 3, 2015
I'm not really enthused about the under belly of life no matter where it's found.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews