McQuade’s skilful crime novel churns up some terrible truths

It's a return to fiction for McQuade whose first novel, 'The Undiscovered Country,', which takes place during the Civil War in the West of Ireland in 1920, preceded an academic non-fiction book, 'Ethical Leadership', “which I think perhaps three people have read,” mused McQuade when he spoke to the Newry Reporter about his latest excellently received offering.

“When you write academic stuff, you write mostly for academics and professional practitioners which is a relatively small market. But a lot of the ideas within that 'Ethical Leadership' book are the foundation of the two novels - but with more jokes and with more plot,” he added with a laugh.

‘Some Service to the State', set in 1925, tells the story of a doctor, new to Northern Ireland, searching for a missing pregnant teenage patient, with the help of a former IRA volunteer recently released from jail. Their enquiries bring them into contact with a community still suffering from the wounds of civil war and uncovers skeletons in the closets of that time and place, leading to the discovery of some monstrous crimes.

It's no wonder McQuade's book takes on heavy subject matter, including the horror of mother and baby homes in Ireland, as he has had a long career in humanitarian work, including being Director of Anti-Slavery International from 2006 to 2017.

“There is a message in the two novels I suppose. It's the idea that unconstrained power corrupts,” he explained.

"The first book was set in an imaginary part of Mayo during the Irish war of Independence. This book is specifically set in south Armagh and Newry and parts of Louth. It's about some of the abuses of power which grew up as a direct result of partition. That means sectarianism in the North for many years, but it also means misogyny, particularly in the South and the unyielding power of reactionary elements of the Catholic Church. That was something I wanted to write about for a long time because it seems to be an important manifestation of a contemporary form of slavery, which Irish society hasn't fully grappled with yet. And then as I was writing about that, one of the things that seemed to strike me is again the idea of a lot of unconstrained power leading to these sorts of abuses being tolerated – or at least having a blind eye turned to them. – so that's sort of what the book is about.”

‘Some Service to the State’ opens with the two main protagonists sitting in the Shelbourne in Newry and a few pages in the reader is led around the back roads to Jonesborough.

American author Patrick Radden Keefe has been highly praised but criticised by some as an outsider writing about the 1972 abduction of Jean McConville in his 2018 award-winning international best seller, ‘Say Nothing.’ McQuade in contrast is closely connected to the landscape, culture and communities he’s writing about, something he admits can be both a help and a hindrance.

"There's always, what they call in sociology, the taking for granted of things – the prejudices and biases that are so fundamental that you don't even think about them anymore – like, why the Tyrone football team is evil. That's something that people in south Armagh understand fundamentally without ever having to articulate its nonsense to anybody else.

If you look across the non-fiction literature associated with the Troubles, some of the very best books have been written by outsiders and people who are perhaps a bit more semi-detached. I think in terms of fiction though, it generally tends to be done best from people who come from that culture and community."

On the other hand, McQuade believes ‘Some Service to the State’ can translate well to audiences outside of the region.

“Some of the themes in the book are universal and good literature will always say something about the human condition.”

While the 58-year-old says if he were 20 years younger he would probably not be writing, but on the ground continuing with his humanitarian aid work, but he also believes the pen yields its own power.

“I do have a belief that the written word can change things because it has changed things. It changes the way people think. And if you can change the way people think you can then change the way people act.”

And action, he feels, is vitally important historically and to this day.

“Ordinary people protesting are the ones who consistently change policies going right back two or three hundred years, looking at the policy on slavery, right up to the present day, looking at policy in relation to the war in Gaza. If we start to think that we can't change things, then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Whereas if we do think we can change things then we tend to make it so. That's why it's important to keep raising our voices, to keep complaining, to keep protesting and to keep introducing new ideas that will assert the humanity of people who are often overlooked.

“You could write an academic thesis which half a dozen people, if you're lucky, will read, or you can try and engage people a bit more through the medium of fiction - and in my case a detective story. That's what I've been trying to do with my two novels and that's what I hope to continue to do if enough people continue to read them.”

‘Some Service to the State’ is available on Austinmacauley.com, Amazon and at all major booksellers.