The Devil's Card

In this unusually accomplished debut novel, first published in Ireland, Maher marvelously evokes the atmosphere of late-19th-century Chicago, particularly that of its Irish community. She uses a true crime--the 1889 murder of prominent Irish physician P. H. Cronin--to reveal the tensions dormant in the city. Tom Martin is an ex-seminarian who has lost his Catholic faith; the American-born son of Irish immigrants, he has never given much thought or concern either to his roots or to the deep involvement of many Irish expatriates in the rising tide of revolution against the hated British. As a reporter covering Cronin's violent death for the Chicago Tribune , Tom begins to learn the secrets of the Clan na Gaelsp ok , an undercover society that will stop at nothing to further the cause of Irish independence. The novel begins and ends 20 years after the Cronin murder with the funeral of Andy Foy, the first person to have befriended 21-year-old Tom upon his arrival in Chicago and the first to reveal to Tom the tragic truth about the crime. Intriguing and well told. (Nov.)