Belfast, A Novel of the Troubles

The Republic of Ireland came into being in 1921, at the end of a bloody insurrection against the British. However, the treaty left the northern six counties under British sovereignty. Since that time, the Protestant majority has dominated the poorer Catholic populace with support from the British Army. In 1972, British troops fired on demonstrators, launching more than twenty-five years of sectarian violence and terror from both sides. Mason Devereux, an American freelance photojournalist, is drawn into doing a project on the violence while visiting Northern Ireland. Devereux makes contact with the Irish Republican Army. The I.R.A. is interested in publicity showing Protestant paramilitaries' violence against Catholics. A deal is struck and Devereux is given access to extraordinary photo opportunities. Devereux accepts the I.R.A.'s assistance, but finds his own way to get incriminating photographs of the I.R.A's own violence. On the verge of a negotiated end of the violence with the British government, a renegade faction of the Irish Republican Army, lead by seventies legendary gunman Michael Flynn, derails that movement toward peace. Flynn and Devereux cross paths in a sequence of violent events that continues the tragedy of Northern Ireland's Troubles.