(For those looking for comparisons) Colin Bateman and Christopher Brookmyre, look out! While I'm at it, let's throw in James Lee Burke as well, since Caimh McDonnell's larger-than-life Irish detective, Bunny McGarry, would make a fine drinking companion for Cletus Purcel - and give him a bunch of much-needed laughs at the same time.
You'll probably gather from the above that I think Caimh McDonnell is a damn fine writer, and I have no hesitation in saying you'd be right. I've read every one in this series, each one at a sitting, unable to put it down.
McDonnell is a master plotter, and, in this volume, he succeeds in producing a gripping story that would be so even without the laughs. He also manages to tie up its mysterious threads in a denouement that, in the context of this cynical age of corruption and political back-stabbing, is as credible as it's unexpected.
I'm not going to give away any spoilers, but take my word for it, he has you guessing right up to the finish line. Plus, in an appropriately cinematic manner (because someone's got to make a movie or a streaming series out of this material), he provides us with not one but two mini-epilogues - one dramatic and one that made me burst out laughing for the umpteenth time.
It's great tale-spinning, but it's also the funniest book I've read since the previous one in the series. The jokes, the sarcastic put-downs, and the wild and wonderful comic creations that are Bunny, his derangedly garrulous "Boy Wonder" Deccie (who somehow manages to tie threads together a scoutmaster would have problems with), the positively surreal Sisters of the Saint, et al., stir in a huge admixture of comedy for which any sitcom writer would give her/his right arm.
The story arc is marvellous, and holds together like Kryptonian Velcro, but every chapter is also a near-self-contained vignette with its own punchline. My favourites were the Pub Quiz (honestly, tears were streaming down my face) and the chapter that introduces the Sisters of the Saint. The latter was as off the wall as the best of Samuel Beckett, but a hell of a sight funnier.
Do yourself a favour: buy every book in this series. You won't regret it!
PS I also learned some Irish!