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Killing of the Tinkers
Shadow Men
Pretty Dead
God Save the Mark: A Novel of Crime and Confusion (Thorndike Basic)
Bad Business (Thorndike Basic)
A Spectacle of Corruption (Thorndike Basic)
It Had to Be You
Island of Bones (Thorndike Core)
Southern Fried
Cadillac Beach
The Ten Word Game
The Bug Funeral
Tampa Burn
Decorated to Death
Darkly Dreaming Dexter (Thorndike Press Large Print Core)
Good Morning, Heartache
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The Madman's Tale (Thorndike Core)
The Mystery of the Yellow Room
No Just Desserts (Thorndike Women's Fiction)
Cat in an Orange Twist (Midnight Louie Mysteries (Hardcover))
Trophy Hunt
Twospot
Nine Wrong Answers
A Homecoming for Murder

The Killing of the Tinkers: A Novel (Jack Taylor)

Average customer rating:

Black, bleak, and beautiful
Killing of the Tinkers writtern for men of a certain age
Reading Bruen is Addictive
Suffers only by comparison to its prequel
Darker than you think.

The Killing of the Tinkers: A Novel (Jack Taylor)
Ken Bruen
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Minotaur
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Similar Items:

The Guards: A Novel
The Magdalen Martyrs
The Dramatist: A Novel
Blitz
Vixen (Inspector Brant)

ASIN: 0312339283
Release Date: 2005-02-10

Book Description

When Jack Taylor blew town at the end of The Guards his alcoholism was a distant memory and sober dreams of a new life in London were shining in his eyes. In the opening pages of The Killing of the Tinkers, Jack's back in Galway a year later with a new leather jacket on his back, a pack of smokes in his pocket, a few grams of coke in his waistband, and a pint of Guinness on his mind. So much for new beginnings.Before long he's sunk into his old patterns, lifting his head from the bar only every few days, appraising his surroundings for mere minutes and then descending deep into the alcoholic, drug-induced fugue he prefers to the real world. But a big gypsy walks into the bar one day during a moment of Jack's clarity and changes all that with a simple request. Jack knows the look in this man's eyes, a look of hopelessness mixed with resolve topped off with a quietly simmering rage; he's seen it in the mirror. Recognizing a kindred soul, Jack agrees to help him, knowing but not admitting that getting involved is going to lead to more bad than good. But in Jack Taylor's world bad and good are part and parcel of the same lost cause, and besides, no one ever accused Jack of having good sense. Ken Bruen wowed critics and readers alike when he introduced Jack Taylor in The Guards; he'll blow them away with The Killing of the Tinkers, a novel of gritty brilliance that cements Bruen's place among the greats of modern crime fiction.

Customer Reviews:

Black, bleak, and beautiful.......2007-04-09

I don't hail from Middle Earth, as one of the previous reviewers, nor do I even care to vacation there, but I am a fan of both noir and quality writing. Ergo, I think this is one terrific book. The great thing about noir (well, all novels really) is that plots do not necessarily need to be complex to be gripping. It is the characters, especially the protagonist, who need to be complex. And, oh, my, is Jack Taylor one complex, messed-up, messed-about dude. Oddly, his drug use did not put me off, as such action often does with fictional characters (and is only one reason why I detest O'Brian's Stephen Maturin character). Rather, it really brought home to me what a sad mess Jack is, what crutches he is willing to limp around on rather than seek and practice medical/psychological help, and how he is a willing assistant to the creation and maintenance of the darkness in which he dwells...and pulls others down alongside him.

I had not read any of the Jack Taylor books prior to this one (and I'll be prompt about remedying that!) but I have read the Brant books by Ken Bruen, and I was delighted to see Brant make a lengthy appearance here, albeit under the name of Keegan. I hope Jack returns to London, I'd love to see him operating on Brant's turf. Jack has more conscience than Brant/Keegan, which may make him more likeable, but also leaves him more vulnerable. Bruen gives us a nicely dark, twisty ending, and left me wondering whether maybe Jack had less conscience than I thought.

One last note, on the lit and music cited or referenced in the book: If you don't like these, and don't understand why they permeate the book, then you have my pity. They don't require explanation, but rather exploration. And if you explore, then I don't pity you, I understand you.

Killing of the Tinkers writtern for men of a certain age.......2006-08-26

I saw an interesting interview of Ken Bruen on television. Mr. Bruen seemed fascinating and has an unusual life story. Although, I am not a fan of crime, murder, or forensics mysteries; I resolved to read one of Ken Bruen's books with high hopes.

A male friend of mine had just read Killing of the Tinkers (did not think much of the book) and was only too happy to send it to me.

From the beginning Ken Bruen's prose is the most sparsely written affair I have ever encountered. There seem to be sentences that are not sentences. We are needing some more character development and less holier-than-thou highfalutin quoting from books, poems and songs of a certain era. Ken preaches to us about literary and artistic items as if we have not been educated. The book has 256 pages but this could probably be condensed to about 120 pages or less. Reason is, Bruen's use of dialog; so 15 sentences of quotations from the characters would use up a page of the book. It is easy to read but then so is a grocery list.

I am troubled by a lot of things in this book but the worst of these is the main character, Jack Taylor, is supposed to be an ex-policeman but he continually makes really stupid mistakes that a police officer would never make. I suppose some would chalk that up to his being a drunk and a drug addict but my Dad was a cop and no matter how messed up you get you do not do a lot of the things Jack Taylor does: like being seen at a large funeral with some Gypsies who have hired him to find a murderer(totally blows any cover he might have wished to have). Then after he is is severely beaten by some gang at his home, he stays in a bar drinking and lets his woman take a cab alone back to the home without checking on her.

I find that Bruen skirts around the juicier details we might wish to read and instead gives us some far flung quote from some other person's book, poem, or song. Very nice work to let someone else do your writing.

Then there is the whole swan thing. What is that? The editor told him he needed something more in the book to fatten it up a bit, I suppose, because it is just plopped down in the middle of the book for no reason.

There is just too much wrong with this book. I am sure Ken Bruen is a smart man but I think he can do better. This book is cleverly contrived to appeal to a segment of the male population between 45 and 60's, who do not have much time to read.

Reading Bruen is Addictive.......2005-12-08

The second novel in Bruen's series about the down-and-out Jack Taylor, ex-cop, sometime private detective, fulltime alcoholic, reading addict--with the new addition of coke to his arsenal-- practically starts where THE GUARDS left off without much of a break. It's almost as if you were reading a continuation of the previous novel. Taylor is hired this time to find the killers of a group of tinkers; his second assignment is to catch whoever is decapitating the swans in Galway.

Taylor's world view is as bleak as December weather. His friends Cathy and Jeff have a child born with Down's syndrome, an example of sorrow gone to seed. I would be over his constant bout with the bottle if he weren't so literate about it all. He's read everybody: Dylan Thomas, Anne Sexton, Robert Frost, Seamus Heaney, Harry Crews, Raymond Chandler. The list goes on and on. He says "my life and certainly my sanity had fled to reading through a thousand dark days." Taylor hates his mother, is not very successful in love and is often makes very bad judgments in his attempts to solve the tinker murders. He sometimes waxes eloquent, however, and you become besotted with him. A suit he got from Vincent de Paul wasn't purchased with him in mind. And his description of Kris Kristofferson's "Sunday Morning Coming Down" as the ultimate "alky anthem" is worth the price of the book.

The ending will blow you away!

Suffers only by comparison to its prequel.......2005-06-20

While "The Guards" debuted Jack Taylor and gave us the first of his Galway-based investigations, this sequel bogs down in the first sixty pages rehashing the previous work's highlights, thus vitiating the new story of a considerable amount of its own dynamism. On its own, "Killing" advances Jack's saga, nimbly expanding some of his (and my) favourite minor characters from take one: unctuous Fr Malachy, the wry "sentry" at the bar stool, and porcine Supt. Clancy. The welcome new additions of blustery Keegan and menacing Fred offset the rather flat Jeff & Catherine match this time around. The minor characters' shared understatement and maudlin sourness establishes neatly and laconically their inimitable Irishness. This is not to say Bruen falls into cliche, quite the contrary.

What suffers after pitting this newcomer against Jack's first case are too many similarities. I cannot divulge specifics as they spoil the plot, but there were repetitions in suspects, crimes, and investigatory procedures (often involving tossing money at Jack's contacts and having them suss out, off the pages, key evidence for Jack to bring to his paying customer) that made much of this novel rather feel casually spun off rather than intricately plotted. Now, some indirection, given the purported motivation of finding out about the "tinkers" deaths despite the "clans" propensity for secrecy makes the comparative lack of detail about this subculture acceptable. But, even more than in "The Guards," the sense of lives lost behind the list of the four murdered travellers that Jack must try to solve appears too evanescent. One powerful vignette of a travellers' camp destroyed by hostile elements among the settled folks recalls real events at Rahoon that occurred in past decades. Still, the whole "tinker" element remains largely overshadowed by more immediate skulduggery for most of the story--even the decapitation of swans!

I was also let down by the puzzling Kiki, who seems to come and go with little reason except as a reason to define metaphysics and provide the obliquely prepared for motivation for her walking out on Jack in one pub scene. Laura, notably, seems not to deserve the fate she meets, and why Jack's attitude towards her is such may be blamed on his coke habit, for little logic can be culled from his actions towards her, given her demonstrative loyalty to him. Since Bruen via Jack's tender perspective is wise to the gentle-yet-cutting manner of Irish women when it comes to Mrs. Bailey, why this perspicacity fails to transfer to the island's younger and impressively willing women confused me as well as Jack's major antagonist this time around.

If I had read this and "The Guards" had never surfaced, it'd gain a higher rating, and my three stars do not diminish Bruen's passion and care for his city and its denizens. I care along with the author and his fictional creations about the scenes he narrates. But with even the same Merton quote repeating again in this sequel (although I was pleased to find Beckett twice!), I feel Bruen's coasting rather than accelerating.

Darker than you think........2005-04-13

I think that "The Guards" was a better novel than this one but even more so "Blitz" and "The White Trilogy," about whom Keegan makes frequent reference, were better.

The addictions of Jack Taylor make the reader uncomfortable, far more than say an angry Harry Bosch or an "under the rock" novel by James Crumley. But then again, Ken Bruen intends that result.

I felt a little uncomfortable with the continued references to George Pelecanos. Possibly this is because "Tinkers" is structured so similarly. What with the continued references to sports, albeit Irish sports, and rock 'n roll, it feels like a Pelecanos novel.

But if it's structured that way, it makes Pelecanos sound like a Nancy Drew mystery writer. Jack is dark, exceeded in this reviewer's recollection only by the aformentioned Crumley.

Notwithstanding any of that, it's brilliant writing and recommended for both Bruen and mystery fans generally. Larry Scantlebury. 4 stars.

Average customer rating:

The Killing of The Tinkers
Ken Bruen
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Minotaur
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OT46PM

Average customer rating:

THE KILLING OF THE TINKERS
KEN BRUEN
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Minotaur
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OTPYHG

Average customer rating:

The Killing Of The Tinkers
Ken Bruen
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Minotaur
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OT9QVQ

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