Book review: The Lost and the Blind

IN 2008, just as the Celtic Tiger is showing signs of crumbling, Shay Govern seeks out Tom Noone with the offer of a ghost writing project.

Having made a fortune Stateside in both construction and mining, and now into his 80s, Donegal-born Govern has turned his attention to Lough Swilly’s Delphi Island, and plans to mine for gold, an undertaking that will potentially revitalise the entire region.

The story he wants written is a biography, of a long forgotten thriller writer named Sebastian Devereaux, an Englishman who, decades earlier, had settled into a hermetic life on the island.

For Tom Noone, the offer — €40,000 — is a godsend. A separated father of a six-year-old girl, Emily, and mired in a custody battle, he struggles to make ends meet.

The author of four detective novels, his main income is derived from a weekly film review slot and any other freelance gigs he can snag.

The fact that he has never even heard of Sebastian Devereaux should be of little importance. But what seems, initially, a straightforward task, indulging the whim of a rich old man, turns quickly complicated.

An associate of Tom’s, Jack Byrne, an ex-Garda detective now running as a somewhat shady private detective, has also been hired by Govern, to locate a man named Gerard Smyth.

Jack has located Smyth but, for financial reasons of his own, is holding off on delivering the news to Govern. And Smyth has an incredible story to tell, one that Tom needs to hear.

In 1940, Smyth, then Karl Uxkull, Danish submariner fighting for the Germans, went overboard in Lough Swilly from a Nazi U-boat while on a top secret mission. During his recovery on Delphi, he witnessed an atrocity: six local children were locked at gunpoint inside a church, and the church burnt to the ground. Now, all these years later, he wants the world to know what happened.

The whole thing sounds far-fetched, even when Tom’s friend, Martin, an avid thriller fan, explains that it bears more than a passing similarity to the plot of one of Devereaux’s novels, Rendezvous at Thira.

Govern, though, confirms the facts and admits that he himself was a boy on Delphi, but at 15 considered too old to burn. The gold mine, he explains, is a philanthropic gesture, a balm to ease his survivor’s guilt and to bring some healing to a community that has kept this secret for far too long.

However, somebody doesn’t want this story told. Soon, Smyth is fished out of the Grand Canal and Jack Byrne has gone missing.

Tom is broken into; Alison Kee, a Special Detective Unit officer, has pronounced herself his sidekick; and Govern’s brother, Franco, who has introduced a consignment of sunken Nazi gold to the equation, is throwing his weight around.

If there are answers to all of Tom’s questions, he is certain they will be found on Delphi.

Over the past decade, Declan Burke — a frequent reviewer on these pages — has established himself as one of Ireland’s foremost crime novelists, with acclaimed work such as The Big O, Absolute Zero Cool and Slaughter’s Hound drawing comparisons with the likes of Carl Hiaasen and Elmore Leonard.

The Lost and the Blind is a departure of sorts, a spy novel with an Irish twist. Tipping the hat to such genre masters as Alistair MacLean and Jack Higgins, this elegantly-paced novel quickly finds its own voice and is elevated to something special by sharp dialogue, well-drawn characters, a wild, convoluted plot, and an ending that keeps its reader on the hook until the very last pages. Fans of a good thriller won’t want to miss this one.