The Informer

Set in 1920s Dublin in the aftermath of the Irish Civil War, the novel centers on "Gypo" Nolan. Having disclosed the whereabouts of his friend Frankie McPhillip to the police for a reward, Gypo finds himself hunted by his revolutionary comrades for this betrayal...

In 1988 IRA terrorist Sean O'Callaghan walked into a police station and gave himself up. Sentenced to 539 years' imprisonment for IRA crimes including two murders and many terrorist attacks, O'Callaghan served six of those years before being released by royal prerogative. The reason? For the previous sixteen years O'Callaghan had been the most highly placed informer within the ranks of the IRA and had fed the Irish Garda with countless pieces of invaluable information. He prevented the assassination of the Prince and Princess of Wales at a London theatre; he sabotaged operations, explained strategy and caused the arrests of many IRA members. He has done more than any individual to unlock the code of silence which governs the IRA's members, and in effect made it possible to fight the war against the terrorists. The Informer is the story of a courageous life lived under the constant threat of discovery and its fatal consequences. It is the story of a very modern hero, who is not without sin but who has done and is doing everything in his power, and at whatever personal cost, to atone for the past. From the Hardcover edition.

From the New York Times bestselling author of American Psycho and Less Than Zero comes a nihilistic novel set in the early eighties that portrays a chilling descent into the abyss beneath L.A.'s gorgeous surfaces. • “Skillfully accomplishes its goal of depicting a modern moral wasteland…. Arguably Ellis's best.” —The Boston Globe The basis of the major motion picture starring Billy Bob Thornton, Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke, The Informers is a seductive and chillingly nihilistic novel, in which Bret Easton Ellis, returns to Los Angeles, the city whose moral badlands he portrayed so unforgettably in Less Than Zero. This time is the early eighties. The characters go to the same schools and eat at the same restaurants. Their voices enfold us as seamlessly as those of DJs heard over a car radio. They have sex with the same boys and girls and buy from the same dealers. In short, they are connected in the only way people can be in that city. Dirk sees his best friend killed in a desert car wreck, then rifles through his pockets for a last joint before the ambulance comes. Cheryl, a wannabe newscaster, chides her future stepdaughter, “You're tan but you don't look happy.” Jamie is a clubland carnivore with a taste for human blood. Look for Bret Easton Ellis’s new novel, The Shards!

When he loses his job as a trader after the stock market crashes, Shigeo Segawa is offered lucrative work as an industrial spy. How could he say no? He is soon assigned to seduce an ex-girlfriend and steal an important formula from her husband, who runs a large chemical company. But when the husband is found murdered, Segawa becomes the prime suspect.

The setting is Catalonia, Spain. The year: 1159. There is ongoing tension between the Christian population and the economically powerful Jewish community in its midst, the former scorning the latter as infidelesnonbelieversand resentful of its financial success, which, through its aptitude for trade, far-reaching connections, and tax-farming, keeps the States treasury solvent. On the other hand, the Jews, while legally owned by (that is, under the protection of) their ruler, live in constant fear that even his authority, though empowered by law, would be unable to contain a rioting mob when incited against them. The main protagonists are Juana, illegitimate daughter of Count Berenguer IV, ruler of Catalonia, whose contrariness and free spirit make her defy the proprieties of life at court, and Vidalon, scion of one of the wealthiest Jewish families in Barcelona, who is addicted to gambling and rebels against the strictures of religious conformity. They are no Romeo and Juliet from rival houses, however. Their affair is born of lust and a shared impulse to flout convention, spiced by the inherent danger to them both. Their adventures are set against and interwoven with the royal politickings and social life of the day and the internal life of the Jewish community. The characters are a mix of real-life persons (Benjamin of Tudela, Count Berenguer, Queen Petronilla, Rabi Abad, and Queen Melisende of Jerusalem) and fictional creations.

Have you ever wondered what was really going on in the inner-plays, secret overhearing, and tacit observations of early modern drama? Taking on the shadowy figure of the early modern informer, this book argues that far more than mere artistic experimentation is happening here. In case studies of metadramatic plays, and the devices which Shakespeare and Jonson constantly revisit, this book offers critical insight into intrinsic connections between informers and authors, discovering an uneasy sense of common practice at the core of the metadrama, which drives both its self-awareness and its paranoia. Drama is most self-revealing at these moments where it reflects upon its own dramatic register: where it is most metadramatic. To understand their metadrama is therefore to understand these most seminal authors in a new way.

A brilliant debut from 'one of the most original new voices of Latin American literature' (Mario Vargas Llosa) 'For anyone who has read the entire works of Gabriel García Márquez, The Informers is a thrilling new discovery' Colm Toibin, Guardian 'One of this year's outstanding books' Financial Times When Gabriel Santoro publishes his first book, a biography of a Jewish family friend who fled Germany for Colombia shortly before World War Two, it never occurs to him that his father will write a devastating review in a national newspaper. Why does he attack him so viciously? Do the pages of his book unwittingly hide some dangerous secret? As Gabriel sets out to discover what lies behind his father's anger, he finds himself undertaking an examination of the guilt and complicity at the heart of Colombian society, as one treacherous act perpetrated in those dark days returns with a vengeance half a century later.