EOIN McNamee’s latest book – The Ultras – is a heady mix of fact and fiction, exploring the shadowy world of security force and loyalist collusion, in a stylised attempt to fill in some of the gaps of the dirty war.
The Ultras features some familiar names, such as the enigmatic Robert Nairac and the ruthless Robin ‘The Jackal’ Jackson, and centres round events like the Miama Showband Massacre. The text has a certain flow and rhythm to it that suits the subject matter well, sentences often seeming to disappear without warning, and staccato prose that almost echoes military jargon.
The protagonist, Agnew, is a former RUC sergeant with a dodgy history. Years after the hidden events that wrecked Agnew’s career, he tries to lay his own ghosts to rest by separating the facts of the past from the myths that have built up around them – almost the opposite of what McNamee does in his writing.
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