Adrian McKinty The Dead Yard

The Dead Yard

Adrian McKinty

Scribner, Mar 2006, $24.00, 306 pp.

ISBN: 0743266439

Leaving Chicago on vacation Michael Forsythe, using the name Brian O'Nolan as he is in the federal witness protection program, goes to Spain's Tenerife, the largest of the Canary Islands. He selected the spot because his choices are limited with the head of the NY mob wanting him dead and the FBI insuring he does not visit the Caribbean. Though Michael afterward realizes he should have known better, he attends a football (soccer) match between Dublin's Shamrock Rovers and London's Milwall in front of five hundred British hooligans and fifty Irish fans. A riot breaks out and Michael is back in jail reading once again How Stella Got Her Groove

Two Brits, Jeremy Barnes and Samantha Caudwell visit Brian to inform him he will be convicted as Blair supports the Spanish government no nonsense policy. Jeremy offers him a choice between five years in a Seville maximum security prison or work with them undercover. Michael tells "Sammy" to send her boy toy packing so they can discuss what British Intel wants. She explains that she runs the Special Ulster Unit that works cases of potential Irish terrorism outside the United Kingdom; she needs him undercover obtaining information on a dangerous faction, the Sons of Cuchulainn, planning something in America.

THE DEAD YARD, the sequel to the magnificent DEAD I WELL MAY BE is a terrific tale starring an "operative" who always is in the wrong place at the wrong time. Michael remains his rascally self though he is softened a bit when he meets Kit, the daughter of the Cuchulainn leader he must bring down. Fans of tense thrillers similar to the Bourne tales will want to read about Michael's latest woes (above description is only the first chapter).