Patrick Radden Keefe

Through the unsolved case of Jean McConville's abduction, Patrick Madden Keefe tells the larger story of the Troubles, investigating Dolours Price, the first woman the join the IRA, who bombed the Old Bailey; Gerry Adams, the politician who helped end the fighting but denied his IRA past; and Brendan Hughes, an IRA commander who broke their code of silence. An unforgettable story forensically reported, Say Nothing explores the extremes people will go for an ideal, and the way societies mend-or don't-after long and bloody conflict. 

A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland

Say Nothing

`A must read' Gillian Flynn `Breathtaking in its scope and ambition... Keefe has produced a searing examination of the nature of truth in war and the toll taken by violence and deceit... Will take its place alongside the best of the books about the Troubles' Sunday Times One night in December 1972, Jean McConville, a mother of ten, was abducted from her home in Belfast and never seen alive again. Her disappearance would haunt her orphaned children, the perpetrators of this terrible crime and a whole society in Northern Ireland for decades. In this powerful, scrupulously reported book, Patrick Radden Keefe offers not just a forensic account of a brutal crime but a vivid portrait of the world in which it happened. The tragedy of an entire country is captured in the spellbinding narrative of a handful of characters, presented in lyrical and unforgettable detail. A poem by Seamus Heaney inspires the title: 'Whatever You Say, Say Nothing'. By defying the culture of silence, Keefe illuminates how a close-knit society fractured; how people chose sides in a conflict and turned to violence; and how, when the shooting stopped, some ex-combatants came to look back in horror at the atrocities they had committed, while others continue to advocate violence even today. Say Nothing deftly weaves the stories of Jean McConville and her family with those of Dolours Price, the first woman to join the IRA as a front-line soldier, who bombed the Old Bailey when barely out of her teens; Gerry Adams, who helped bring an end to the fighting, but denied his own IRA past; Brendan Hughes, a fearsome IRA commander who turned on Adams after the peace process and broke the IRA's code of silence; and other indelible figures. By capturing the intrigue, the drama and the profound human cost of the Troubles, the book presents a searing chronicle of the lengths that people are willing to go to in pursuit of a political ideal, and the ways in which societies mend - or don't - in the aftermath of a long and bloody conflict.

This is an intense exploration, not just of the kidnapping and murder of Jean McConville, but also of the impact the violence of "The Troubles" on witnesses and on the perpetrators themselves.  I expected this to be more of a true crime style book, but in fact it is more of an in-depth history of the events in and around Belfast during the 1970s-1990s.  It explored the alleged actions of many people involved in this disappearance and made for fascinating and disturbing reading.

shellybn

A true crime book set in the background of the Troubles, that is essentially a crash course in the history of the Troubles. Thoroughly researched and a cornerstone in modern methodology related to oral histories. 

Quentin Gibeau

You guys I am learning so much about Ireland 

Margo Koss

Chris Dailey

Terrifyingly true story of the Troubles told through the lens of a missing mother and her family's fallout. Beginning in Ireland in the late 1960's, the origin of new IRA take root as a crop of young revolutionaries escalate the tensions with the UK, meanwhile ordinary citizens are caught in the crossfire. Loyalty, political idealism, suffering, and the tension between the individual vs the collective all standout. While it hits a lull at times, the majority reads with the drama of fiction coupled with the intensity of real world consequences and is worthy of picking up if you have any interest in the period.

elizabeth

I didn't know much about the Troubles before reading this. I found it hard to find an explainer that wasn't clearly biased or incoherently messy. And, to some extent, I understand why. It's relatively recent history. All parties involved are difficult to entirely defend. And, most of all, it's difficult to tell the story of a conflict when the two sides (and I'm totally oversimplifying when I say there are two sides) fundamentally disagree about the nature of the conflict itself. But I only understand these things now because of Say Nothing. 

Keefe writes primarily about the key players, inner workings of the IRA, but doesn't glorify them. In fact, Keefe has a remarkable way of remaining balanced wihout being coy about it or sounding coldly detached from the victories achieved or atrocities committed by any of the involved parties. Likewise, he has a way of capturing the complexities of the conflict without giving into its sprawling scope. By weaving the seemingly small story of Jean McConville['s murder] amid seemingly greater stories, Keefe provides the reader with a helpful--and human--touchpoint to make sense of the Troubles and to allow the book's themes to appear out of the fog.

Empire of Pain has moved up my to-read list.

"A narrative about a notorious killing that took place in Northern Ireland during The Troubles and its devastating repercussions to this day"--

Fascinating book! I haven’t seen the genre of “narrative nonfiction” much, but it felt much more accessible to me than a typical history book. If anything, it felt more anthropological in nature in the ways it ties historical events together through the stories relayed from the interviewees to the author. I listened to this as an audiobook and found at one point that I was confused on the timeline, so unsure if the recording was out of chapter order or if that was my own error, but otherwise I thought this was very educational and intriguing throughout.

Erin Goss

Laura Mauler

This book is not about the kidnapping and murder of Jean McConville, it is about Gerry Adams, Dolours and Marian Price, Brendan Hughes, and other big figures in the IRA and Provisional IRA. Pieces of Jean McConville's story, and that of her family, are dropped into the narrative at irregular intervals, disrupting the flow of both her story and the main story. I wish that Jean's story was separated out and made into its own book because I found it very compelling, and the story of the IRA/Provo bigwigs less so. I also didn't like how whenever a new person was introduced in the main story (IRA/Provo bigwigs story) we had to have the person's whole biography. It made for really jarring reading, taking me out of the flow of the story and into some pointless multi-page backstory, and then rushing me forward back into the flow with little more than the sense of "Ok, this guy is IRA/British secret service/other paramilitary". 

I like knowing more about Northern Ireland and the Troubles, but this book wasn't an enjoyable read.

Liz B

Best work of non-fiction I've read in ages. I particularly recommend the audiobook version.

Maddie

Compelling and addicting

Fantastic look into The Troubles through the lens of a murder. Great intro to what happened during this tumultuous time in Irish and British history.

Christine Bruce

A mother goes missing, children are left to fend for themselves- separated and sent to institutions. Decades later, her body is found on a beach. Decades before, a country fights for independence. 
Say Nothing is the story of a murder, but it is so much more than that. It's the history of the independence movement, and of the descent into domestic terrorism. The way it separated cities along religious lines. The way it orphaned children and made parents childless and stole spouses in the night. How it devolved into bombs and ambushes. 
The desperation and frustration that brought the fighters to that point is also detailed. The torture, the everyday micro-aggressions that escalated into major aggressions. The way it all stemmed from just wanting to be their own country. 
This book was a high source of things I never knew, as an American. So much of it felt like it should have taken place forever ago. Not with combatants the same age as my dad, not when I was the same age as school children caught by shrapnel in an explosion in London. This was recent history, people mentioned are still alive and recently active politicians. Many of the people mentioned are still alive. 
This is modern history, these things just happened. But that's the point- the importance of oral history. The way the stories people tell are sometimes the best way to preserve facts, even when they are filled with emotion, because that emotion makes the history being told REAL. It's what brings it alive for the people who weren't there. 
So often while listening to this book I would have to pause because my mind was reeling. The amount of 'that escalated quickly' that occurred in this book was astounding. Tensions were so consistently high, a literal powder keg of emotions and anger and frustration. All together in a small little island that had been vying for independence for a century. They looked to history for inspiration to get people to pay attention to their plight. 
But in the midst of a righteous cause, so many people were hurt. And for what? So many lies and deaths and suffering. And what was the result? A family was broken, a woman was broken, friendships were torn asunder and mothers died without knowing what happened to their children. Keefe begs the question. If you will destroy anything to make a country better, who are you making it better for? When is the cost too high?

very well written and it clarified a lot of things by highlighting contradictions.  Is Gerry Adams a terrorist, a politician, a godsend for peace in N. Ireland?  Maybe all of those. 

I was also struck by how many of the street names and areas I recognized from songs I know (ie. from Van Morrison)

Dana Kraft

very well written and it clarified a lot of things by highlighting contradictions.  Is Gerry Adams a terrorist, a politician, a godsend for peace in N. Ireland?  Maybe all of those. 

I was also struck by how many of the street names and areas I recognized from songs I know (ie. from Van Morrison)

Ethan Hill

There’s nothing quite like a book that totally and completely lives up to the acclaim it’s received.

Queena Li

Amazing! Equal parts true crime, case study in counterinsurgency, family tragedy, and political soap opera.

Fraser Simons

Powerful and well written. Based on 4 years of research and additional sources. The book is so well presented because it has a central narrative surrounding the kidnapping of a particular woman and then moved in chronological order as you find out what happened to that person while it expounds on the troubles in chunks that make everything hit home. 

Exceptional, heavy, and thought provoking.

Caitlyn Baldwin

A work that's both captivating and haunting. It was interesting to hear some narrative surrounding The Troubles in Northern Ireland. Keefe is thoroughly researched, with interviews from people on every side of the conflict.

Cindy Lieberman

A thoroughly researched story of families torn apart by the IRA and the organization’s complicated history of secrecy. A mother of 10, recently widowed, is “disappeared” from her home. Who was responsible and where is she now, some 40 years later? And why did members of this secretive organization agree to be interviewed for posterity, their recordings housed in a special collections room at Boston College? I remember hearing about the hunger strikes and bombings: This includes significant backstory as well as infighting that was not well covered in the US press.

Jeff Brown 

First off, this is a fabulous book! I have wanted, for a long time, to read a fairly complete, concise book about The Troubles and this fit my needs perfectly (the author admits that the book is not a completely balanced account, mainly because his contacts and the interviews provided more access from the IRA’s POV — I mean, why would the British government want to get involved in a writer’s book, for example? Nevertheless, it does not feel unbalanced to a non-Irish-historian such as myself). 

The bookends of the story is a mother of 10 who was dragged out of her house by a mob, never seen again, and the family left behind. It provides the background of the pain, anger, anguish, violence and sorrow of the times — even after peace is achieved. And do not feel that the final chapter is only the author’s final thoughts of the book — there a great shocking ending. A must read!

Not to get boring for a moment (it gets better in the next paragraph, trust me), but, secondly, I found out something about myself. I’ve always enjoyed history books, as far back as I can remember. But, admittedly, they can be rather dry at times.

I’ve never have gotten deep into genres, especially sub-genres. After reading “Killing of the Flower Moon” last year, it was not only one of my favorite books of the year, but of all time. After “Say Nothing”, I found out about the sub-genre of narrative nonfiction. It’s equally researched, but not like reading a textbook. When the facts are clear, and the story could call for it, you don’t feel like there are any embellishments. And it appreciated, like in the final chapter of this book, when the author has to piece a lot of items together to reach his conclusion, that he is clear that he has gone from the fact-based storytelling mode to a point that when he says “it appears” or “the evidence leads us to believe”, you feel part of the discovery process. It’s clear that this point is thoroughly researched speculation, and allows you to either think that the conclusion is possible, or that it just may be spot on. That’s what makes it a great ending.

I believe I’ve found a new style of writing that I will pursue from now on. No more “WWII started when ...... “ books in my near future.

Danai koftori

What an extraordinary book. I learned so much about the Troubles and how this whole era has shaped the society and life in Northern Ireland. Exhaustively researched and beautifully written this is an excellent book for anyone who wants to learn more about the Troubles and the human cost and sacrifice that was prevelent during that time but also the effect it has had up until today. Cannot recommend this book enough.

Shelby Doherty

** spoiler alert **
           Likes:
- Important history is discussed, especially given that we are currently living in a world that seems to be so divided at times
- Read in parallel with Guest House for Young Widows. Very interesting to see the similarities in thinking and the similarities in the events. Overall I much preferred Guest House for Young Widows though.

Dislikes: 
- I feel like this book is advertised as a "true crime" book. I feel it is much more a history book. In a way, this is nice because ultimately I wanted to come away with a better picture of the Troubles but it really was not what I was expecting. I feel that this particular crime was not talked about very much at all (only the beginning and end) when I felt this was the primary point pushed
- Lots of people were discussed in this book. At times hard to keep track of who is who.
- Felt like it was way to long for what I got out of it.

Maytal

That was a wild ride, and I learned so much about a conflict and country I knew zero about before picking this up.

Grace Emilia Machon

This book was incredible, I learned so much about the conflict between the Britain, N.I and the Republic of Ireland that was completely missing from my education. I had no idea it was so recent and so raw. 

The only reason I haven’t given it 5 stars is because it has taken be over half a year to finish it.

Heather Killeen

A fascinating and well researched account! I definitely want to add this one to my non-fiction collection.

Matthew Hayward

Incredibly gripping account of an extraordinary period of conflict in Northern Ireland and the mix of political and personal dramas and tragedies than ensue. 
Was particularly useful for me in educating myself about my cultural heritage, having family from Belfast and visited the city through some of the years mentioned in this book. 
An excellent read—I will put the rest of the author's books on my reading list!

Say Nothing A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland

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