I’ve just finished the third book in Ken Bruen’s Jack Taylor series. I wish I’d read them in order; I read #2 (The Killing of the Tinkers) first, then #1 (the absolutely incredible Guards), then #4 (The Dramatist), and now this, The Magdalen Martyrs, #3. In some series, this might not matter, but Jack’s situation changes so much in these books. It’s hard to keep track of his wavering sobriety; his important but precipitous friendships; his sense of purpose, self, or equanimity; even his living arrangements or his reading. He does make progress, but it’s so fragile and sporadic that reading these out of order makes it harder to see that. Unlike Matthew Scudder, something of an American counterpart to Jack and one who is mentioned in this novel, Jack’s progress is much less linear. Jack feels so much the weight of the past– his own, his father’s, his schoolmates’, Galway’s, Ireland’s, I guess. And the recent past, the occurrences of these books, weigh as heavily as his childhood.
In Martyrs, especially, Jack doesn’t really, in the neat and tidy sense, solve anything. He does some interviewing and instigating, but he’s no detective. There’s really no whodunit? We pretty much know who’s responsible for what, and there’s an amazing amount of guilt to go around. Information often comes in lightning-like installments from Cathy or Brendan; nature and time are often allowed to take their course, and often that’s the only resolution we have. People might punished, not for the crimes they did commit, but for those they’re framed for. Jack, his own worst critic, readily admits his mistakes in foresight, follow-through, or judgment. It’s hard to disagree, but it’s not the point.
These books are absolutely riveting. Jack is compelling. The pace seems intense, the revelations profound. But it’s not based on the “mystery”; it’s all in the character and the sense of place.
