Down these green streets

Can crime fiction tell us more about contemporary Ireland than any other kind of writing? This collection takes up that question, looking at how the genre has responded to the country's landscape after the Troubles and to the upheaval that followed the Celtic Tiger years. Presented as the first book devoted to this subject, it gives each chapter to a different contributor, and each approaches Irish crime writing from a distinct angle. Declan Hughes, for instance, considers how American culture has shaped the genre in Ireland, while Tana French examines how crime fiction reflects Irish identity in the post-Celtic Tiger era.

The volume brings together a wide range of voices. Its contributors include well-known crime novelists such as John Connolly, Tana French, John Banville and Alex Barclay, and some of the pieces appear here for the first time. Other writers, critics and journalists in the lineup include Adrian McKinty, Alan Glynn, Brian McGilloway, Ken Bruen, Stuart Neville, Jane Casey, Gene Kerrigan, Eoin McNamee, Ruth Dudley Edwards and Tara Brady, among others. The full list runs to some two dozen names, all presented alphabetically.

Written to appeal to scholars and to general readers alike, the book suits anyone interested in Irish writing, the history of crime fiction, or the way a national literature responds to a changing society.