The pedestrian paperback cover might have put me off until I opened it up, but chancing across this unassuming little epic has turned out to be one of the best choices I've made in a while, where books are concerned. In fact, this is one of the best books I've read all year. The characters are so invariably likable, realistic in their thinking but not without their necessary literary melodramatics, and principled but not plagued by manufactured struggles of conscience as so many of this type of figure in military novels often are. Higgins writes dialects believably but comprehensibly, and this is certainly a book for the masses. Without resorting to offensive stereotypes, this book shows us strong women, motivated people of colour, and human historical figures. The writing style is atmospheric and sets the scene very strongly, while trotting along at a brisk pace. My only gripe there is with some of the awkward phrases that could have been ironed out, such as a carriage "being got ready" instead of "being readied," or the strange repetition of an "inexplicable tenderness flooded through him" nearly two hundred pages apart.I can't complain, though. This was a great, gripping read. If you like thrillers, Westerns, or 19th century history, this may be the book for you.
A little different time and place for this one from Higgins. Set in the US at the end of the Civil war, but mostly in Ireland if follows a Confederate. Surgeon and Calvary Officer who has returned to Ireland where he travels to an ancestral home looking for some peace and quiet.Unfortunately Ireland is anything but, the peasants and crofters are becoming fed up with English land owners and tensions are high. When the officer sees the conditions the lower class have to endure and the attitude of the landowners, he slowly begins to side against the owners and becomes involved in the local confrontations. An interesting period piece playing on the inequalities of the social classes of the time.
What do You think about Pay The Devil (2000)?
Kinda of a snoozer. Former Confederate solider who runs off to Ireland when he realizes the South is getting their backsides handed to them. Speaking of which, has the South realized the war is over...better yet, do they know the results?! And why the eff am I capitalizing south? It's an f ing direction. I always get harassed in the the south for being a 'Yank'...thems fighting words to a Sox fan kids, FIGHTING WORDS. Don't be angry we evolved quicker. I digress, anyways, he rolls to Ireland, bc
—Kerry
