JOHN CONNOLLY - The Unquiet (2007)

John Connolly (born May 31, 1968, Dublin) is an Irish writer who is best known for his series of novels starring private detective Charlie Parker. His first novel, Every Dead Thing, was met with critical acclaim; it was nominated for the Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel and went on to win the 2000 Shamus Award for Best First Private Eye Novel (he is the first author outside of the US to have won the award). Connolly's debut introduced readers to the anti-hero Charlie Parker, a former police officer hunting the killer of his wife and daughter. Connolly has since written a further 5 books in the popular Parker series and a non-Parker thriller, as well as venturing outside of the crime genre with the publication of first, an anthology of ghost stories and later, a novel about a young boy's coming-of-age journey through a fantasy realm during World War II England. Several film adaptations of his works are currently in development; the earliest to appear to audiences will be partially based on the short story "The New Daughter", and stars Kevin Costner and Ivana Baquero, previously seen in the acclaimed film Pan's Labyrinth. Connolly is also known to tour extensively to promote the launch of his books. In 2007, Connolly made book-store appearances in Ireland, United Kingdom, United States, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Taiwan to promote The Unquiet.


The Unquiet

I

Where can a dead man go?
A question with an answer only dead men know.

Nickel Creek, When in Rome

Prologue

This world is full of broken things: broken hearts and broken promises, broken people. This world, too, is a fragile construct, a honeycomb place where the past leaches into the present, where the weight of blood guilt and old sins causes lives to collapse and forces children to lie with the remains of their fathers in the tangled ruins of the aftermath.

I am broken, and I have broken in return. Now I wonder how much hurt can be visited upon other before before the universe takes action, before some outside forces decides that enough has been endured. I once thought that it was a question of balance, but I no longer believe that. I think that what I have done was out of all proportion to what was done to me, but it is the nature of revenge. It scalates. It cannot be controlled. One hurts invites another, on and on until the original injury is all but forgotten in the chaos of what follows.

I was a revenger once. I will be one no more.

But this world is full of broken things.