If McNamee’s work is often described as somewhere between crime writing and literary fiction, it might be more accurate to say that he self-consciously employs crime tropes to draw attention to the way in which political violence in the north is narrativised. What could pass as classic noir fare is elevated to something else, a kind of anti-myth that interrogates its own dishonesty.

Conor Crummey Criticism 27th August 2025