I received a free copy of “ Stone’s Corner” through Net Galley in return for an honest review.
I really dislike giving a book a bad review, but I just did not like Stone’s Corner. The story is set in Northern Ireland during the recent “ Troubles”, i.e., sectarian warfare between Catholic and Protestants, their urban warriors or terrorists ( depending who is getting killed and who is doing the killing,) and the British.

The book is bleak. The bleak weather overlays the bleak lives of people without hope. Living on the dole, idle men drink, smoke and plot. Young people have only the hope of escaping the province. Sudden police raids, bombings and executions are the rule. So: a dark and blasted story that is told in painstakingly detailed narrative. Descriptions of daily living fill every page as the plot progressed so slowly. One has to decipher the local argot - good for verisimilitude of locale, but not always easy to get.
The language is quite bad. Violence is common. I know that the author was striving for an effect- showing the cruelty common on all sides. , but it got too much for me to enjoy the reading. “Stone’s Corner” is the first in a projected trilogy. and I cannot imagine sticking though three volumes.
I admit that I struggled to get through the first third of the book and gave up.