- Hardcover: 384 pages
- Publisher: HarperPerennial; 1st U.S. Ed edition (Jan 1993)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0060179988
- ISBN-13: 978-0060179984
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 15.5 x 3.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 228,555 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Book Description
A modern classic from one of the great thriller writers of our era.
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Product Description
Gary Brennard is young and keen, just the qualities his MI5 desk chief seeks for an undercover operation in Northern Ireland. There is a suspicion that an informer is among the villagers of County Tyrone. Gerald Seymour is the author of "Condition Black", "The Glory Boys" and "Harry's Game".
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Gerald Seymour's novels have transported us to so many places festering with suppurating animosities: the Balkans, Afghanistan, Kurdish Iraq, Italy, the old U.S.S.R., Lebanon, South Africa. In THE JOURNEYMAN TAILOR, we're off to one of the most intractable of Gordian knots, Northern Ireland.
Jon Jo Donnelly, a legend in his own time, is an IRA assassin on undercover assignment in the heart of England with his sniper rifle and cache of explosives. Back in Donnelly's Ulster home town, Song Bird is a British Security Service (MI5) informant embedded in the IRA infrastructure. Gary "Bren" Brennard, a newbie to MI5, is rushed over in short order to Northern Ireland to help run Song Bird after his predecessor's cover is blown.
Jon Jo is killing at will in Britain's hinterland. The PM wants his head on a platter yesterday. MI5's plan is to lure Donnelly back to his farm and family, at which time he can be isolated by Song Bird for elimination by Her Majesty's forces.
The focus of this thriller isn't Jon Jo, Song Bird or Bren. Rather, it's young Cathy Parker, ruefully characterized as "a slip of a thing" by the Assistant Under-Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, whose ears have been burned by Parker's no-compromise lecture on Song Bird's importance. Cathy is Bren's boss on the ground and the informer's recruiter and chief handler.
In Seymour's other novels that I've read, the primary protagonist's motives are revealed. In Parker's case, we learn little of her background other than she's the renegade daughter of affluent English parents. In the now, she's red-haired, 5 foot 4 inches tall, weighs 8 stone 3 pounds, obsessively driven by her job, idolized by her male peers, backed to the max by her superiors, and affectionately regarded by MI5's otherwise bitter rivals in the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the Special Air Services. An alpha female that draws males like moths to light. Will Bren's wings get singed?
Since Seymour doesn't repeat a main character in other novels, it's unlikely we're to meet Cathy again. A pity, since, to me at least, she's proved to be one of the author's most engaging creations. Parker aside, however, this riveting book continue's the author's tradition of giving the reader a (presumably) realistic insight into the minds and hearts of the ordinary people who fight the gritty conflicts in the grotty corners of the civilized world where there are no winners and losers - only survivors. This is good stuff - the best of the genre on pulp fiction shelves.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Without doubt this is the best book i have ever read. Gerald Seymour's style of writing means that the reader is constantly at the edge of his seat and is never able to put the book down. The book is excellent at informing the reader about the brutallity of the war in Northern Ireland from brutal IRA bombings in London to SAS ambushes in high streets. The reader never bores as MI5 intensifies its hunt for a top IRA terrorist bombing mainland Britain. To do so a highly trained Intelligence Officer and her inexperienced MI5 assistant must keep their informant-Codename "Songbird" -talking. With a dramatic climax on a Tyrone mountain top this book is superb and its realisim is astounding.
Format:Hardcover
SAFE READING - NO SPOILERS
Although is is better than this, I encountered him first as beach reading; I never leave books to chance, i.e. finding some on the airport bookshop shelves and always take around five with me and had organised a series for a Greek holiday. I have been hooked ever since and usually have one lined up for every holiday reading. Lying on a far-away beach, it is alluring to find oneself transported to the Balkans, Afghanistan, Kurdish Iraq, Italy, the old U.S.S.R., Lebanon, South Africa and so on.
Although it is not Literature, he does not strive for that; what he writes are detailed, well-researched, page-turners and thought-provoking thrillers and, despite their fictional nature, they do ring true in many ways - the journalist in him coming out between the lines and, without doubt, he has been around as they say.
This novel swings between the high politics and intelligence services in London and Northern Ireland's secret terrorist underclass, painting a detailed picture of the I.R.A. and the Troubles.
Highly recommended.
Although is is better than this, I encountered him first as beach reading; I never leave books to chance, i.e. finding some on the airport bookshop shelves and always take around five with me and had organised a series for a Greek holiday. I have been hooked ever since and usually have one lined up for every holiday reading. Lying on a far-away beach, it is alluring to find oneself transported to the Balkans, Afghanistan, Kurdish Iraq, Italy, the old U.S.S.R., Lebanon, South Africa and so on.
Although it is not Literature, he does not strive for that; what he writes are detailed, well-researched, page-turners and thought-provoking thrillers and, despite their fictional nature, they do ring true in many ways - the journalist in him coming out between the lines and, without doubt, he has been around as they say.
This novel swings between the high politics and intelligence services in London and Northern Ireland's secret terrorist underclass, painting a detailed picture of the I.R.A. and the Troubles.
Highly recommended.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
A decent story with some incredulity
Overall this is a readable book and it is really based on a very simple storyline about undercover work and the Provisional Irish Republican Army in Northern Ireland/Ulster. Read more
Published on 16 Sep 2000 by duncan.williamson@tesco.net
Indescribable
This book gives the closest view ever of the secret war in Ulster; the characters of the informer and his handler are unforgettable. Read more
Published on 19 July 1999
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