A reminder of just how much the Good Friday Agreement accomplished ... It’s hard to render an episode in a centuries-old struggle as a caper story, but Carroll lets in just enough history to pull it off, mostly.
Engrossing ... Reads like a political thriller, with deep dives into the backgrounds of the IRA operatives and extensive accounts of investigations by detectives and explosives experts from Scotland Yard and other government agencies ... Keefe is a flat-out master storyteller ... The centerpiece tale here of Thatcher's near-assassination needs little embellishment to be riveting.
A gripping, detailed and richly layered account of the bombing and its consequences ... Understated ... The great virtue of Carroll’s excellent book is that it takes the Brighton bombing back out of these parallel universes and into the real world of conflict in which it happened. He explores, as dispassionately as possible, the mentality that shaped killers like Magee ... Fascinating.
Carroll gives the definitive account of this terror attack, delving into the security lapses and placing the events in a larger geopolitical context ... This is must reading for anyone interested in the history of the Troubles.
