I think this is a dad read. The story is loosely based on a real robbery of a major Belfast bank in the mid 2000s. Two Irish mobsters- Ructions and Panzer -go in on a bank heist together with an inside woman named Elenor. The mechanism of the scheme is a tiger kidnapping of two guards at a bank on their rotating shift day. Things get messy quickly, as true intentions and limitations get revealed for better or worse. But in true B movie glory, those brought low have a chance at glorious redemption through one last act of heroism. The dialogue is overburdened and more bluster than content, most glaringly in unerotic sex scenes or limp linguistic power plays between paper-thin underworld characters. High tension plot points or chase sequences fizzle out as the audience is informed flatly that the protagonist’s schemes involving “counter-surveillance measures have worked,” or some such. There is a very strong trigger warning early in the book, one that looms over what could be a low-calorie romp of a tale with low stakes and a modest pot.

First published in Ireland in 2018; published by Melville House on April 6, 2021

Northern Heist begins with the planning and execution of a bank robbery and ends with two trials. James “Ructions” O’Hare faces a criminal trial for masterminding the bank robbery. Tiny Murdoch faces an IRA court martial for misusing his position. From the robbery through the trials and at all points in between, Richard O’Rawe tells an absorbing and convincing crime story.

The robbery is conceived by Ructions and his uncle, Johnny “Panzer” O’Hare. The plan requires Ructions to have an affair with Eleanor Proctor, whose husband Frank is a Belfast banker. Ructions has a girlfriend named Maria but won’t let that stand in the way of the robbery. As Panzer notes with pride, Ructions has “a flair for handling the women.” From Eleanor, Ructions will obtain a schedule of staff rotations. Then their hired guns will kidnap two trusted bank employees who are scheduled to work together and will hold their families hostage while the employees give them access to the vault. One empty vault later and the O’Hares will be wealthy men.

The plan calls for Eleanor to be killed when she’s no longer useful, as she’s the only loose end who can identify Ructions. The plan takes a detour when Ructions falls in love with Eleanor. Another glitch arises when Murdoch suspects that Panzer is up to something. Murdoch taxes crimes on behalf of the IRA and he’s convinced that Panzer has committed crimes without paying the tax. Murdoch has long wanted to make trouble for Panzer’s son Finbarr, a suspected pedophile, and has long wanted to acquire Panzer’s farm. Using the IRA as a smokescreen, Murdoch launches a scheme to accomplish his goals.

Character motivations and dialog have an authentic feel. The crime’s intersection with the IRA gives the plot a unique twist. In contrast to most modern American crime novels, the crime that O’Rawe develops is simple and credible. The story’s credibility isn’t surprising. As a former IRA bank robber, O’Rawe understands his subject matter. At the same time, the plot unfolds with sufficient complexity to keep the reader guessing at what might happen next. This is O’Rawe’s debut novel, but it is executed with the sure hand of a master craftsman.

RECOMMENDED

Northern Heist takes place in 2004, when a former IRA heavyweight and expert bank robber named James “Ructions” O’Hare comes up with a plan to steal truckloads of cash from the National Bank on High Street in Belfast. He figures that the haul will get them ₤35 to 36 million in cash, and turns to his crime boss uncle, Johnny “Panzer” O’Hare for financing. Panzer agrees, because part of the plan is to stiff the Provos, the Provisional Wing of the Irish Republican Army, who impose a fifty-percent tax on any criminal activity that takes place anywhere in the north of Ireland.
Ructions who’s been sleeping with the wife of the bank manager for a couple of years, has learned all of its operational and security secrets from her. When Panzer asks if he’s fallen in love with her, Ructions lies and tells his uncle ‘No.’ On the other hand however, when asked if his profligate son Finnbar has knowledge of the heist, Panzer also lies, and tells his nephew ‘No.’
The robbery attempt goes forward, aided by several ex-paramilitary gangsters acting as tiger kidnappers and with the first of several double-crosses in place, while the police, and the IRA, both pull out all the stops, trying to catch Ructions and his uncle Panzer in the act. But in the end, a pair of trials, one in the courts, the other by the IRA, determine the outcome of this pulsating, relentlessly exciting yarn that’s based on an actual unsolved robbery that nearly derailed the Good Friday Peace Accord of 1998 . . . the agreement which halted the ‘Troubles’ and stopped the sectarian violence that had plagued the area for nearly four decades.
The novel’s spot-on accuracy is informed by Mr. O’Rawe’s own experiences, first as an IRA operative, and then as an inmate in the infamous Long Kesh Prison. He’s the real deal, and his novel is as compelling as it is fascinating!

NORTHERN HEIST
Richard O’Rawe
Melville House
ISBN 978-1612199030
Hardcover
Thriller

NORTHERN HEIST almost got past me. I am glad that it did not. Author Richard O’Rawe is the real deal, having been an operative for
The Provisional Irish Republican Army (“IRA”) and also having served hard prison time for bank robbery. While O’Rawe’s prior books have been non-fiction, NORTHERN HEIST, his debut novel, demonstrates a dark storytelling ability in the form of a piece of Emerald noir which is an instant classic.

We learn fairly early on that James “Ructions” O’Hare, who sets the events of NORTHERN HEIST rolling, is a bank robber who is planning a bank robbery. That is all that we know initially as we follow him about in the book’s present-tense narrative as he begins to set things up, first with this crew, then with that, all the while keeping Panzer O’Hare, his uncle and erstwhile boss, informed about what is going on. Actually, he isn’t quite telling Uncle Panzer everything, a river of deceit and distrust that flows both ways. Ructions doesn’t want his cousin Finbarr --- Panzer’s son --- to know about the job or to be involved with it in any way. There are a number of reasons for this, one of them being that Finbarr is unreliable. That is the least of his sins, as we eventually learn during the course of a cringe-inducing vignette. One cannot help recalling the admonition that three people can keep a secret if two of them are dead while reading NORTHERN HEIST, given that secrets and double-crosses abound. Ructions himself is fairly honest with his fellow thieves, given that he rarely out-and-out lies to them, though he is cheating on his girlfriend with a married woman who is also going to play a very important part in the robbery he is planning. We learn the details of the Northern heist gradually against the backdrop of Belfast in 2004 and the uneasy peace that holds tenuously among multiple parties, of which various factions of the IRA are neither gone nor forgotten. Ructions has no particular desire to pay tax or tribute to a troublesome IRA bullyboy who is as determined to wet his beak with the spoils of whatever Ructions is planning as Ructions is to make sure that the pig doesn’t get so much of a taste. The story takes an unexpected turn when Ructions endangers himself in order to save one of his co-conspirators, with the result being that NORTHERN HEIST as it nears its conclusions goes from being a dark, gritty thriller to a courtroom drama where justice ultimately occurs outside of the courtroom. You might see one but not all of the endings coming but you will be unable to stop reading just for the joy of seeing how they all happen.

O’Rawe in NORTHERN LIGHTS takes what might have been in lesser hands a very complicated topic --- the street politics of Belfast in the early 2000s --- and renders it comprehensible without sacrificing accuracy or emotion. The violence is explosive and the language is occasionally coarse, but neither prevents a bit of nobility and redemption to ultimately shine through, sometimes within the darkest of souls. Okay, maybe not the darkest, but close. NORTHERN LIGHTS may be O’Rawe’s first excursion into fiction, but hopefully it will not be the last, and meeting at some future point the characters, bad and less bad, who make it to the end of the tale would be just fine as well. Recommended.

Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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Loved the setting of Northern Heist. Features great characters with interesting backstories. I will say, the book does seem familiar and doesn't totally separate itself from projects in the genre.