Bleed a River Deep (Inspector Devlin Mystery, Book 3) [Paperback]

Brian McGilloway (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Pan Publishing (2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0330460846
• ISBN-13: 978-0330460842
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.1 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,157,863 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Brian McGilloway was born in Derry, Northern Ireland in 1974. After studying English at Queen's University, Belfast, he took up a teaching position in St Columb's College in Derry, where he is currently Head of English.

His first novel, Borderlands, published by Macmillan New Writing, was shortlisted for the CWA New Blood Dagger 2007 and was hailed by The Times as 'one of (2007's) most impressive debuts.' The second novel in the series, Gallows Lane, was shortlisted for the 2009 Irish Book Awards/Ireland AM Crime Novel of the Year. The new Devlin novel, The Rising, will be published this Spring in hardback in the UK, alongside the paperback of the third novel, Bleed A River Deep. The US edition of Bleed A River Deep will be available in Sept. 2010, published by Minotaur.

Brian lives near the Irish borderlands with his wife and their three sons

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars McGilloway should not be missed, February 26, 2010

By 

E. Crowley (QUINCY, MA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Bleed a River Deep (Inspector Devlin Mystery 3) (Hardcover)

BLEED A RIVER DEEP is the third book in the Inspector Benedict Devlin series by Brian McGilloway. Devlin lives in Donegal, near the border with Northern Ireland and it is not uncommon for crimes in one country to spill into the other.

BLEED A RIVER DEEP is filled with events that show indisputably that Ireland is a country firmly planted in the 21st century. Devlin must deal with the attempted murder of a former US senator, a body in a bog, the murder of a childhood friend, the trafficking of women from Eastern Europe as sex slaves, an aborted bank robbery, an environmental disaster, and a gold rush.

McGilloway keeps all the threads clear and brings the various strands together for a reasonable and reasoned conclusion. Ben Devlin is a character well-worth meeting so readers shouldn't miss reading the first two Ben Devlin books, BORDERLANDS and GALLOWS LANE either.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars fantastic police procedural, September 19, 2010

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Bleed a River Deep (Inspector Devlin Mystery) (Hardcover)

US Senator Cathal Hagan is the special guest at opening of the Orcas gold mine near Lifford in the Borderlands. Security is extremely tight, but Garda inspector Benedict Devlin, pulled from a bank robbery-murder case to lead the protection of the VIPs, fails at keeping a childhood friend environmentalist Leon Bradley from shooting the guest; thankfully with a fake gun.

Blamed for neglect, he is suspended for two weeks. However, when someone kills Bradley, Devlin investigates the mine and a bank job. Devlin persuades his Northern counterpart Inspector Jim Hendry to assist him as he wonders why Bradley and the illegal Chechen were killed.

The third Inspector Devlin police procedural (see Borderlands and Gallows Lane) is a fantastic thriller as the hero struggles to solve two murders while on suspension so has no official backing. The story line is action-packed from the moment Devlin sees his friend holding a gun for the first time since they played with toy pistols as five years old children. With a deep look at the illegal immigration problem in Europe not as publicized as the Arizona brouhaha, Brian McGilloway provides an entertaining investigative thriller.

Harriet Klausner

4.0 out of 5 stars Bleed a River Deep, December 7, 2010

By 

Gloria Feit (Long Beach, NY) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Bleed a River Deep (Inspector Devlin Mystery) (Hardcover)

As this newest book in the series begins, Inspector Benedict ("Ben") Devlin has set his sights on a very wealthy. influential and powerful man, John Weston, who he suspects is guilty of . . . something, he's not quite sure what. But his very attitude of arrogance and something akin to condescension raises Devlin's hackles. He first meets Weston at his company's sixteen acres of Donegal bogland within which sits Ireland's newest and largest goldmine; when he enters the man's office, he cannot help but look out of the windows, which allow a view "revealing both the expanse of his goldmine and, to the other side, the majesty of the Donegal landscape in which he had quite literally carved his niche." But he has come here on this day in preparation for a visit by a U.S. Senator who is about to formally open the site.

Devlin is charged with ensuring the safety of the Senator, a fierce hawk vis-à-vis the Iraq war and a harsh critic of terrorism, the latter perhaps hypocritical coming, as it did, from a politician with links to an IRA support group, which in turn had incited Ireland's own anti-war activists. That, added to threats from the environmental lobby only adds to the concern. All of which is borne out quite vividly when the man, as feared, attacked, the event made worse, for Devlin, when the attacker is recognized as the brother of a childhood friend. And for his boss, Supt. Harry Patterson, this is the last straw after a series of perceived `mistakes' [of conscience and principle] on Devlin's part, and he is suspended.

But Devlin feels compelled to continue the investigation on which he had been working: What at first blush appeared to be a case of identity theft turns into something much more sinister: illegal immigration and its close relative, people smuggling, an all-too-familiar scenario with only the geographic particulars and the ethnicity of the victims varying.

This is the third Devlin novel. The writing is compelling, its protagonist a very human one [not the anguished, hard-drinking man one has come to expect in the genre], and it is recommended.