THE WRONG KIND OF BLOOD

TITLE: THE WRONG KIND OF BLOOD
AUTHOR: DECLAN HUGHES
Pages: 346
Date: 19/03/2011
Grade: 4
Details: no. 1 Ed Loy Mystery
Library

Ed Loy has been living in America, where he worked as a private investigator, for 20 years when he returns home to bury his mother. On the night of the funeral he's asked by Linda Dawson to look for her husband, who has been missing for a few days. Although he is reluctant, Ed does agree to investigate and soon finds himself up to his neck in murder, secrets, gangland crime, corruption and mindless violence.
The Ireland he has returned to is nothing like the Ireland he left so many years ago, but it does appear that the past is playing a huge part in the mystery Ed is investigating in the present. And maybe getting to the bottom of somebody else's mystery will help Ed solve a mystery of his own.

This was a good crime story. It was also a very violent crime story and one that doesn't show Ireland in the best possible light. However, one of the reasons the book is good is because it's all too plausible.
The descriptions of Irish politics and the various areas of Dublin in which the story is set are very recognisable and those descriptions paint a very clear picture of the setting.
With Ed Loy, Declan Hughes has created a realistic and interesting character. Ed Loy has enough weaknesses to make him human, and shows enough kindness towards others to make him likable.
I needed to find a new series of mysteries like I needed a hole in the head, but I will be reading more in this series. This first book has managed to hook me.