The Jury Remains Out: CAL by Bernard MacLaverty

Acclaimed as literary novels, they are steeped in crime – but is it kosher to call them Irish crime fiction novels? YOU decide! Or, y’know, don’t! This week: CAL by Bernard MacLaverty

“Cal’s mother died when he was a child and he and his father, who works in the local abattoir, are under threat to get out from Loyalists who are itching to coin the phrase ethnic cleansing a decade or so early … What lifts CAL above its almost satirically grim subject matter is MacLaverty’s deliciously precise detailing and his dedication to his main character … not the least pleasure of reading it is to rediscover in Bernard MacLaverty another Northern Irish writer who can stand toe to toe with the rest of them, and with the great Brian Moore in particular.” John Self, Asylum

Comedy and humour are not among the stylistic features one would readily associate with Bernard MacLaverty’s works. CAL, for instance, his most famous book (which was also successfully filmed), is a haunting study of a nineteen-year-old Catholic in the midst of the Northern Irish Troubles and his desperate attempt to break away from this violent background—an attempt doomed to failure. On the surface, his writing seems a brilliant example of Seamus Deane’s hyperbolical dictum: “If there is anything more depressing than Ulster fact it must be Ulster fiction.” – International Fiction Review