Murder In Connemara

The bestselling author of the Irish Village mysteries sets her new series in Galway County, where former New York interior designer Tara Meehan finds murder in the ruins. Former New Yorker and interior designer Tara Meehan is eagerly anticipating the grand opening of her architectural salvage shop Renewals in her newly adopted home of Galway. She's in the midst of preparations when heiress Veronica O'Farrell bursts in to announce she’s ready for some renewal of her own. To celebrate one year of sobriety, she’s invited seven people she wronged in her drinking days to historic Ballynahinch Castle Hotel in neighboring Connemara to make amends in style. But perhaps one among them is not so eager to pardon her past misdeeds. Veronica is found lying in the ruins of manor house Clifden Castle with an antique Tara Brooch buried in her heart—the same brooch Tara Meehan admired in her shop the day before, posting a photo with the caption: #Killerbrooch. Now she’s a prime suspect, along with Veronica’s guests, all of whom had motives to stab the heiress. It’s up to Tara to pin down the guilty party . . .

In the first installment of bestselling author Carlene O'Connor's new Home to Ireland Mystery series, New York Tara Meehan's first trip to Galway, Ireland may be her last. Jump right into the beauty and splendor—and murder—of Tara’s Irish adventure! With a gorgeous setting, suspicious characters, and a deadly mystery—Murder in Galway will have you packing your bags… Tara never imagined her introduction to Ireland like this—carrying her mam's ashes to honor her final request: "Tell Johnny I'm sorry...Take me home." She's never met her mam's estranged brother, Johnny Meehan, who owns an architectural salvage business in Galway. Although Tara is immediately charmed by the medieval city, the locals seem wary of strangers and a gypsy warns her that death is all around. When Tara arrives at her uncle's stone cottage, the prophesy seems true. A dead man lies sprawled over the threshold in a pool of blood. The victim turns out to be Johnny's wealthiest client, and her missing uncle is the garda's number-one suspect. In trying to find Johnny and solve the crime, Tara uncovers her mam and uncle's troubled past. But with a desperate killer about, she had better mind herself, or they'll be tossing her ashes in Galway Bay...

In this enchanting new read in the fan-favorite series from a USA Today bestselling author, garda of County Cork, Ireland, Siobhán O’Sullivan and Macdaras Flannery, are about to get married at last. But just as the rowdy O’Sullivan brood and all the regulars of the local bistro have gathered at the church, the nuptials come to an abrupt halt when the discovery of an unidentified skeleton puts the wedding on pause… If only her mother could be here! The entire O’Sullivan brood—not to mention the regulars from Naomi’s Bistro—have gathered at St. Mary’s Church for the wedding of Siobhán and Macdara. It’s not every day you see two garda marrying each other. Only Siobhán’s brother James is missing. They can’t start without him. But when James finally comes racing in, he’s covered in dirt and babbling he’s found a human skeleton in the old slurry pit at the farmhouse. What farmhouse? Macdara sheepishly admits he was saving it as a wedding surprise: he purchased an abandoned dairy farm. Duty calls, so the engaged garda decide to put the wedding on hold to investigate. James leads them to a skeleton clothed in rags that resemble a tattered tuxedo. As an elderly neighbor approaches, she cries out that these must be the remains of her one true love who never showed up on their wedding day, fifty years ago. The garda have a cold case on their hands, which heats up the following day when a fresh corpse appears on top of the bridegroom’s bones. With a killer at large, they need to watch their backs—or the nearly wedded couple may be parted by death before they’ve even taken their vows. . . “Fans of charming Irish mysteries will delight in the ways this convoluted case ensnares the heroine and her supporting cast.” —Kirkus Reviews

Winner 1996 Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Playwright; Winner 1996 George Devine Award for Most Promising Playwright For one week each autumn, Mick Dowd is hired to disinter the bones in certain sections of his local cemetery, to make way for new arrivals. As the time approaches for him to dig up those of his own late wife, strange rumours regarding his involvement in her sudden death seven years ago gradually begin to resurface.

After joining the police force of her small Irish village, a local woman must investigate the murder of a stranger in this cozy mystery novel. After solving two murders in the County Cork village of Kilbane, Siobhán O’Sullivan has accepted her calling and decided to join the Garda Síochána. The O’Sullivan clan couldn’t be prouder, but there’s no time to celebrate as she’s already on another case, summoned by the local priest who just found a dead man in the St. Mary’s graveyard—aboveground. He’s a stranger, but the priest has heard talk of an American tourist in town, searching for his Irish ancestor. As Siobhán begins to dig for a motive among the gnarled roots of the victim’s family tree, she will need to stay two steps ahead of the killer or end up with more than one foot in the grave. “Captivating . . . Fans of mysteries with an Irish flavor will look forward to Siobhán and Macdara’s further adventures.”—Publishers Weekly

The first volume in Tim Robinson's phenomenal Connemara Trilogy - which Robert Macfarlane has called 'One of the most remarkable non-fiction projects undertaken in English'. In its landscape, history and folklore, Connemara is a singular region: ill-defined geographically, and yet unmistakably a place apart from the rest of Ireland. Tim Robinson, who established himself as Ireland's most brilliant living non-fiction writer with the two-volume Stones of Aran, moved from Aran to Connemara nearly twenty years ago. This book is the result of his extraordinary engagement with the mountains, bogs and shorelines of the region, and with its folklore and its often terrible history: a work as beautiful and surprising as the place it attempts to describe. Chosen as a book of the year by Iain Sinclair, Robert Macfarlane and Colm Tóibín 'One of the greatest writers of lands ... No one has disentangled the tales the stones of Ireland have to tell so deftly and retold them so beautifully' Fintan O'Toole 'Dazzling ... an indubitable classic' Giles Foden, Condé Nast Traveller 'He is that rarest of phenomena, a scientist and an artist, and his method is to combine scientific rigour with artistic reverie in a seamless blend that both informs and delights' John Banville 'One of contemporary Ireland's finest literary stylists' Joseph O'Connor, Guardian

In a remote—and superstitious—village in County Cork, Ireland, Garda Siobhán O'Sullivan must solve a murder where the prime suspects are fairies . . . Family is everything to Siobhán, which now includes her fiancé Macdara Flannery. So when his cousin Jane frantically calls for help, the two garda rush from Kilbane to the rural village where Jane and her mother have recently moved. When they arrive, they find Jane in a state outside the cottage. Inside, Aunt Ellen lies on her bed in a fancy red dress, no longer breathing. A pillow on the floor and a nearby teacup suggest the woman has been poisoned and smothered. The local villagers, who are devout believers in Irish folklore, insist the cottage is cursed—built on a fairy path. Although the townsfolk blame malevolent fairies, Siobhán and Macdara must follow the path of a murderer all too human—but just as evil . . . “Plenty of surprising twists and oodles of Irish charm make this an entertaining read.” —Kirkus Reviews

The triumphant conclusion to Tim Robinson's extraordinary Connemara trilogy, which Robert Macfarlane has called 'one of the most remarkable non-fiction projects undertaken in English'. Robinson writes about the people, places and history of south Connemara - one of Ireland's last Gaelic-speaking enclaves - with the encyclopaedic knowledge of a cartographer and the grace of a born writer. From the man who has been praised in the highest terms by Joseph O'Connor ('One of contemporary Ireland's finest literary stylists''), John Burnside ('one of the finest of contemporary prose stylists'), Fintan O'Toole ('Simply one of the best non-fiction prose writers currently at work') and Giles Foden ('an indubitable classic'), among many others, this is one of the publishing events of 2011 and the conclusion of one of the great literary projects of our time. 'He is that rarest of phenomena, a scientist and an artist, and his method is to combine scientific rigour with artistic reverie in a seamless blend that both informs and delights.' John Banville, Guardian 'A masterpiece of travel and topographical writing, and an incomparable and enthralling meditation on times past ... This perfectly pitched work opens readers up to the world around them' Sunday Times 'Anyone willing to get lost in this book will be left with indelible mental images of places they may never have visited but will now never forget' Dermot Bolger, Irish Mail on Sunday 'Will endure into the far future ... He knows this world as no one else does, and writes about it with awe and love, but also with measured grace, an artist's eye and a scientist's sensibility' Colm Toibin, Sunday Business Post Books of the Year 'Robinson is a marvel ... the supreme practitioner of geo-graphy, the writing of places' Fintan O'Toole, Observer Books of the Year