Chilling In The Name Of

Having wowed crime fans with his previous novels, Adrian McKinty is on a roll. Set in the dark days of 1981 when the north was a cold house for gays, immigrants and outsiders of every hue and the hunger strikes raged, his latest opus The Cold, Cold Ground is sure to confirm his status as one of Ireland’s grittiest storytellers.

Anne Sexton, 02 Feb 2012

The Cold, Cold Ground takes us back to 1981, the Hunger Strikes and the months of rioting that followed Bobby Sands’ death.

“I suppose 1981 is the time that was most significant for me as a child,” says McKinty. “All my memories of that time are incredibly intense and vivid, so I decided it was a time period I wanted to do.”

One would think it would be difficult to capture ‘80s Northern Ireland from the rather different environs of Melbourne, where the author now lives, but McKinty says not.

“It really wasn’t. It was tremendous fun. All the memories just came flooding back. My problem wasn’t coming up with stuff to say, but deciding what not to say. It was just extraordinary what happened in just a few months.

“From Bobby Sands’ funeral when half a million people were on the streets, to rioting every night and bombs going off. My problem was editing because I had so much stuff. I had tons of material, newspapers and books. I was even able to do some interviews with policemen and some IRA men when I was back home.”

McKinty’s hero is Sean Duffy, a Catholic cop in the overwhelmingly Protestant Royal Ulster Constabulary, living a somewhat precarious existence in Protestant Carrickfergus.

“I thought it would be much more interesting to take a Catholic boy and put him in a Protestant town and have him as one of the very few Catholics in the RUC. It made it more interesting for me as a writer, and hopefully for the reader as well, because you have all these lines and loyalties and ideas of selfhood that are crossing.”

Duffy is a man seeking the right path for himself – and in a way for Ireland. Before joining the RUC, McKinty writes that Sean had volunteered for the IRA.

“Right after Bloody Sunday in Derry, he wanted to join something, he wanted to help out, but he’s confused. He goes to join the IRA. They tell him to finish his degree first. He is a joiner and by a circuitous route he ends up in the police. I think that is an interesting dynamic. His psyche is that of someone who wants to help, but he doesn’t know what the correct method is. Even though he is in the police, he is still not sure it was the right thing to do. I loved having a conflicted character. It was so much fun to play with.”

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