We Were Kings

by Thomas O'Malley, Douglas Graham Purdy

Overview

In 1950's Boston, the Irish Republican Army is running guns and killing witnesses. Cal and Dante are committed to stopping them.

When a body is discovered at the Charlestown locks — tarred, feathered and shot to death — it appears to be a gangland killing, and is almost immediately dismissed. However, Cal O'Brien's cousin, Boston PD detective Owen Lackey, recognizes the murder style as the typical retribution for IRA informers. Combined with a tip-off about a boat coming into Boston weighed down with stolen guns and ammunition, the body in the locks hints that much more may be at stake than a one-off hit.

Serpents in the Cold introduced us to Cal and Dante, whose previous investigation brought them to the highest ranks of Boston's political elite. This time, Cal and Dante descend into the city's shadowy underbelly — a world of packed dance halls, Irish wakes, and funeral parlors. There they discover a terrorist plot that will shake the city to its core and bring them head-to-head not only with Cal's past, but with the IRA Army Council itself.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316323536
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	06/21/2016
Series:	The Boston Saga , #2
Pages:	384
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

Thomas O'Malley is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and currently teaches on the faculty of creative writing at Dartmouth College. He lives in the Boston area.

Editorial Reviews

04/04/2016
It’s June 1954, and an oppressive heat entombs Boston in O’Malley and Purdy’s well-written if bleak sequel to 2015’s Serpents in the Cold. Their broken antiheroes, Dante Cooper and Cal O’Brien, have each recently suffered a personal loss, and those losses are keenly felt throughout the novel. Heroin addict Dante has a fingertip hold on sobriety, while ex-cop Cal struggles to keep his security business afloat. Both answer the call, though, when Det. Owen Mackey, Cal’s policeman cousin, asks for their help in his pursuit of IRA sympathizers who are running guns and murdering suspected informers. The Irish club scene of the time has a role in the story, as does Dante’s skill at the piano, but the unforgiving temperatures, easy violence, and grim state of the South Boston neighborhoods overwhelm any joy that the bright lights and dance floors might impart. More than one bloody killing will catch readers by surprise. Agent: Richard Abate, 3 Arts Entertainment. (June)

Publishers Weekly

"Well-written . . . Written with verve . . . Strikingly visual with a very readable style."—Benjamin Boulden, Mystery Scene

"This brilliant second entry in the Boston Saga sizzles . . . This stunning narrative will enrapture fans of James Crumley and the astonishingly deep and dark Sara Gran."—Booklist (starred review)

"The authors deliver noir done well in dark-city descriptions and a cast of damaged characters."—Kirkus Reviews

PRAISE FOR SERPENTS IN THE COLD:


"In the best noir tradition, these co-authors shine a smoky light on lives often lived in the shadows."—Carol Iaciofano, WBUR

"Like Sara Gran's Dope, Serpents in the Cold lovingly revisits the hardboiled noir. From the dives of Dorchester to the Locke-Ober Café, John Garfield and Richard Widmark would feel right at home in O'Malley and Purdy's bygone, fallen Boston."—Stewart O'Nan, author of West of Sunset

From the Publisher

05/01/2016
In 1950s Boston, a body is discovered tarred and feathered at the Charlestown locks in a fashion typical of a local gang. However, police detective Owen Mackey recalls that the Irish Republican Army (IRA) meted out similar punishment to informants when they ruled the city's underworld before World War II. In addition, Mackey learns that a boat with ties to the IRA recently entered Boston Harbor transporting contraband firearms and ammunition. Mackey enlists O'Brien, his cousin and an ex-cop, and O'Brien's friend Dante Cooper to perform reconnaissance for him. When Mackey is slain, O'Brien and Cooper redouble their efforts to avenge their friend. VERDICT The authors' second installment (after Serpents in the Cold) is a solid addition to the noir genre. Their coarse depictions of Boston will appeal to fans of Dennis Lehane and Robert Parker's Jesse Stone series. New readers should begin with the first book. [See Prepub Alert, 12/14/16.]—Russell Michalak, Goldey-Beacom Coll. Lib., Wilmington, DE

Library Journal

2016-03-17
Tough guys in a tough town as the Irish Republican Army wages war in 1950s Boston. O'Malley and Purdy's sequel to Serpents in the Cold (2015) picks up several years after Cal O'Brien lost his wife in a firebombing, and his mental scars are still deep and raw. He's a former cop, now a private investigator, and recruits his piano-playing, reformed junky pal, Dante Cooper, to help the police in Irish Boston. Owen Mackey, Cal's cousin and a police detective, senses that his case is not just a bizarre murder and asks for their eyes and ears in the Irish neighborhoods of the city. Boston suffers in a heat wave and bodies start showing up. One, tarred and feathered, sends a signal that this is bigger than local gangs at play. In Galway, Sean "the General" Mullen is managing a gun and ammunition trade from Boston to the homeland for the IRA and sends his soldiers to fix the problem of a stalled shipment. The war of Republicans and Royalists is imported to Boston Harbor. It's hard not to compare this novel with its predecessor, especially with an overabundance of references to the back story. But this one drags. Although O'Malley and Purdy do violence extremely well, the suspense in this story is anemic—an endless watch of sitting in cars and drinking, sitting in bars and drinking, Cal and Dante each wallowing in flashbacks to life before trauma. The story starts well as the mystery builds on the body count, but once the reader knows who's on the killing end and who's trying to take control of the missing boatload of guns, it becomes predictable. One good outnumbered shootout to close the loop and the novel ends with a fizzle. This book feels like a place holder for the next. The authors deliver noir done well in dark-city descriptions and a cast of damaged characters but fall short on delivering a thrill.

Kirkus Reviews