The Rúin by Dervla McTiernan

The Rúin is a dark, suspenseful debut set in Galway, first in a series. It follows Detective Cormac Reilly as he relocates from Dublin with his girlfriend, and (somewhat mysteriously) is treated with hostility by his new police department, which assigns him to cold cases (some of which are not just cold but wet - he thinks his colleagues are deliberately spilling coffee on the case files to show their contempt of him), despite an impressive 20-year career. When Jack Blake commits suicide by jumping in the River Corrib, his fiancee and sister are devastated and argue there are circumstances regarding his death that make murder more likely.

Soon Cormac is involved because Jack's death connects back to two neglected children he encountered in one of his first cases. He is told not to investigate the suicide but to reopen the original case, which makes no sense to him - to do both he has to carefully juggle the office politics of the garda station (the national police of the Republic of Ireland are called An Garda Síochána, and handle community safety, crime reporting, and traffic enforcement), which includes very unpleasant characters. Even his friend Danny seems to be cheating on his wife, while warning Cormac no one else can be trusted. Fun workplace - mine has challenging moments but there are always a few people I can rely on!. Cormac’s girlfriend, Emma, is a scientist recruited to do research at a lab in Galway and she is so excited about her new job, Cormac cannot tell her the move is not working out well for him and he misses Dublin.

In addition to Cormac, there are some well-drawn and realistic characters. Aishling (I believe I learned how to say Ash-ling from Maeve Binchy) is an overworked young doctor, worried about an unplanned pregnancy. At first, she is too distressed by Jack’s death to question it. But Jack’s sister Maude is a strong character and her conviction that Jack did not kill himself gives Aishling the strength to protest the runaround they’re getting from the police.

Maude shook her head firmly. ‘I have evidence,’ she said. ‘Evidence that I think proves that the story the police gave us was bullshit.’

Aishling felt hot, then cold. ‘What sort of evidence?’

Maude smiled for the first time. ‘The best kind. Video.’

There are vivid, minor characters like Jack’s adoptive mother, Aishling’s friend Mary, and Carrie, a female detective the men don’t seem to like (as is typical in police procedurals). The pace of the story is very deliberate, and sometimes it felt as if there should have been a book that came before this one. The police resent Cormac as a Dublin outsider but, more specifically, there is corruption throughout the department and they are probably afraid he will find out and turn them all in. Rúin translates to ‘The Secret’ in the Irish language and there are plenty of secrets in this book!

This series now has four books, including The Unquiet Grave, which is new. I had hoped to buy it on this trip but staff at Charlie Byrne's Bookshop told me it hasn’t been published in Ireland yet, only Australia. She implied that the publisher is not doing much to promote McTiernan in Ireland and said the backlist sells out quickly (I prefer this series to the author’s standalone thrillers). I went on looking and eventually found a used copy of this book at a charity shop in Virginia, County Cavan, and started rereading at once. It is fun to see mentions of places in Galway I now recognize.

Bookish Coincidence: In the book, Jack’s sister Maude is staying at the Galway Radisson, which is exactly where I stayed just a few days ago!

Title: The Ruin
Author: Dervla McTiernan
Publication: Sphere/Little, Brown, paperback, 2018
Genre: Mystery
Source: Personal copy

The Ruin contributed to the Cloak and Dagger Challenge 2026.