DIG INTO COLD CASE

GALWAY SETS SCENE TO DISCOVER HIDDEN SECRETS

It’s an ill wind, or maybe a gloomy cloud with a silver lining. Young police officer Cormac Reilly drives slowly through the heavy rain and gloom along an isolated country road on the stormy west coast of Ireland, contemplating giving up but then backtracking to find a rotting house and within, two neglected children and their dead mother.

Like her fictional detective, Irish-born Perth author Dervla McTiernan has also had to negotiate the slings and arrows of misfortune in pursuit of her quarry, which has led her from adversity to where she is now – enjoying a new life in Australia and with it, a place in the growing ranks of outstanding female Australian crime writers.

Just as stormy weather and bleak events drove the fictional Reilly to put that gloomy episode behind him until 20 years later, when what first appears to be a suicide reopens an old case and with it casts doubts on the initial investigation’s findings and the integrity of police, so too did the Global Financial Crisis that drove Ireland to the point of economic ruin force McTiernan to put the fallout of fiscal and business catastrophe behind her.

McTiernan was born in County Cork but became a long-time resident of Galway, including studying law at university there. “It is a beautiful place – with terrible weather most of the time,’’ she laughs.

Life was good. When she was 27 she set up a small legal practice on the outskirts of Galway, taking on a considerable load of property work. But when the real estate boom that was driving her business went bust as the GFC began to bite, the impact was devastating for her firm. Her husband, Kenny, a civil engineer, was similarly in dire straits.

The thought of trying to resurrect her practice was too much. McTiernan was pregnant with the couple’s second child.

So they packed up and migrated to Australia, starting a new life in Perth and, for McTiernan, realising a dream to write the stories she’d been working and reworking in her mind for so long. It is not surprising that Galway should have become the setting for her Cormac Reilly story, which is to grow into three books.

“Reading was my first love and I had always wanted to write. I also wanted more time with the children. I couldn’t see a way to make that happen with the kind of hours I was working as a lawyer. All of that prompted our move to Australia.’’

Ireland’s loss is Australia’s gain, with McTiernan’s first published novel already heralding an exciting new presence in crime writing.

But a problem with her health almost stopped her writing career in its tracks.

The Irish meaning of the title of her book, The Ruin, is – as she says – “something hidden, a mystery, or a secret’’. Reilly’s investigations into the cold case that has haunted his career uncovers secrets that lead him to question whether he can trust his colleagues.

Around the time interest in The Ruin was growing among publishers, something hidden revealed itself to threaten McTiernan’s life.

Doctors found a tumour growing at the base of her brain. She was told it was probably a craniopharyngioma that could lead to blindness and would shorten her life. The diagnosis was made in July 2016. Surgeons operated within days, on August 3.

“It all happened so quickly, I don’t think I really had time to fully process it before I was undergoing surgery. The recovery was long and slow – 10 days in hospital, 10 weeks at home, the best part of a year trying to get medication balanced – and that was the most challenging part,’’ she says.

“These days I feel very well, though I have a condition called pan-hypopituitarism as a result of the surgery. The practical impact of that is that I’m not supposed to do vigorous exercise – news that wasn’t too devastating for a dedicated reader.

“The vast majority of the time I feel very well, and life proceeds very much as normal.’’

Which is good news for fans of crime fiction.

Another Cormac Reilly book is completed and ready for publication, and a third is on the way, due out in March 2020.

“I grew up with a great pride in my country, in my nationality, and that pride has been bruised over the years, with some of the revelations of our failings as a nation. I think that the questions Cormac Reilly strives to answer are questions that I have about Ireland, about our society, and about what we need to do to put things right,’’ she says. TITLE: The Ruin.

AUTHOR: Dervla McTiernan. PUBLISHER: HarperCollins.

“IRELAND’S LOSS IS AUSTRALIA’S GAIN, WITH MCTIERNAN’S FIRST PUBLISHED NOVEL ALREADY HERALDING AN EXCITING NEW PRESENCE IN CRIME WRITING.”