Critical Mick

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The Dark Place
by Sam Millar
Brandon Books, 2009

Noir So Emphatically Blackened that its Eyes Have Been Gouged Out

It's not Private Eye Karl Kane who has a troubled past as a haunted ex-cop, an alcoholic exile or rocker whose guitar case is full of busted dreams. Author Sam Millar knows worlds even more deceitful and malicious than the music industry: as related in his lauded memoir On The Brinks, Millar is an ex-con who has spent hard stretches in the most brutal prisons in Northern Ireland and America. He is the real deal, and it shows in his writing.

The Dark Place follows Karl Kane, the gritty, gripping detective introduced in 2008's Bloodstorm. This second in the series conforms to the familiar norms of the PI genre: after a teasing, terrifying prologue Kane is seen sitting in his sweltering office on Belfast's Hill Street. In walks a woman in trouble- this time, a teenaged heroin addict whose younger sister, Martina Ferris, has disappeared. The client is deperately worried and the cops are not interested in looking for a recovering junkie with a reputation for running away, so it is down to debt-ridden Kane to take the case.

Kane's investigation takes him through the underbelly of city and society, into peripheral contact with corrupt and outmatched cops, and into his own painful past. As bodies pile up and his enemies circle in, Karl Kane learns what is rotten and terrifying behind the respectable facades of the city's elite and institutions (literally, in certain cases!). Fans of the PI form will be pleased- and be pleased that Millar is not afraid to break conventions. By the climax, there is no predicting which way Millar is going to play it out.

The places that Kane goes on his journey are exceptionally dark. Imagine Philip Marlowe investigating the disappearances from Se7en or Saw. Marlowe would probably take the first flight back to LA, but Kane is a wee harcore Norn Iron man. Graphic and violent with more deviant sex than Val McDermid and the most convincing drug trip since Gene Kerrigan's The Midnight Choir, Millar's Belfast is worlds away from the catchy punk rock jaunt of Colin Bateman's Divorcing Jack.

Like Bateman, Millar leavens his grit with humor. With Martina Ferris missing and other young, violated bodies turning up, Kane cannot sit comfortably back hammering out his own manuscripts and studying the racing papers. Is it because old Karl is a valiant knight at heart? Erm, no. He cannot sit still because he is the only PI in all of crime fiction with raging hemorrhoids.

Piles aside, Millar's dialogue is sharp and fast. The writing has real originality. I had never before heard of the villain's disturbing MO, and the manner in which Kane learns the killer's identity is both plausible and something that would never have come from an American PI novel.

The Dark Place has its weaknesses. One crucial character, for instance, does not get so much as a mention earlier on in the novel, and is suddenly of incredible importance to Kane. Another fault is not Millar's, but comes from Brandon Books: the blurb on the back cover gives away a prime twist. Like Keith Barry I prefer not to see it coming and let the pretty chickies shriek away at their own pace.

Roid rage!

Critical Mick says: Unsettlingly twisted, The Dark Place truly is the Belfast version of The Silence of the Lambs. Begin reading at your own risk! And start when the day is nice and bright, with bunnies hopping reassuringly across flowery fields. It will take a lot of Walt Disney to counterbalance a place as dark as Karl Kane's. Sam Millar is a powerful contender for winning the Award for Best Book that Critical Mick read in 2009.

hippies and the homeless!

Critical Mick's October 2009 interview with Sam Millar may be inspected at your leisure.

Yo! This review and all content on the DFA Guide site are copyright 2009 Mick Halpin. All links to other sites and documents are copyright to whatever source wrote something cool enough for Mick to give it a referral. Try to claim them as your own work and bad karma will catch up with you, baby. Believe it.

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This Page Was Last Updated On 27 September, 2009.