I hear the sirens in the street A Detective Sean Duffy novel

*Starred Review* A headless torso found in a suitcase presents just the kind of case Detective Inspector Sean Duffy of the Royal Ulster Constabulary wants to pursue, even after he's ordered to let it go. When the victim is identified as an American poisoned with a rare plant, and the suitcase is found to have belonged to Martin McAlpine an army reservist and brother of a baronet killed months earlier, presumably by the IRA the case becomes even more interesting, especially after the detective who did a perfunctory investigation of McAlpine's murder reopens that case and is himself murdered. It's 1982, when violence in Northern Ireland threatens to escalate after Britain's invasion of the Falkland Islands pulls away troops that support the RUC. In this pitch-perfect sequel to The Cold Cold Ground (2012), the second in the author's Troubles Trilogy, Duffy is nearly overwhelmed by politics. This is crime fiction at its best: a police procedural with dialogue that's crisp and occasionally lighthearted; blistering action that's often lethal; McKinty's mordant Belfastian wit; and a protagonist readers won't want to leave behind when the trilogy ends.--Leber, Michele Copyright 2010 Booklist

Set in 1982, McKinty's uneven second outing for Belfast Det. Sgt. Sean Duffy shifts focus away from the IRA enforcers of the first installment, 2012's The Cold Cold Ground, toward Northern Ireland's Anglo-Protestant elite. While war rages in the Falklands, the brash, intelligent Duffy chases down cold leads after Irish-American tourist Bill O'Rourke turns up dismembered in a suitcase that just happened to belong to a Loyalist farmer, Martin McAlpine, a member of the landed gentry assassinated by the IRA. The only progress he makes is with Martin's beautiful young widow, Emma, while the only hope for the depressed country as a whole may rest with real-life high-flying American automaker John DeLorean. Punchy, pop culture-tinged prose and a charismatic hero help offset Duffy's slowly developing case, which fails to pick up any real momentum. Agent: Bob Mecoy, Creative Book Services. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.