Sam Millar est Irlandais: ces quatre mots suffisent presque à définir cet écrivain et ses romans dont deux sont traduits chez Fayard Noir. Militant de l'IRA, il fut incarcéré dans d'ignobles conditions dans les geôles anglaises. Expatrié aux Etats-Unis, il purge ensuite une peine de vingt ans de prison pour avoir organisé le plus grand casse de l'histoire américaine. De quoi avoir du feu, du sang et des cendres dans la tête. Toutes ces cicatrices qui ne se refermeront jamais, ses démons, Sam Millar en a fait un atout pour écrire des histoires emplies de personnages tout droit sortis du film "Freaks" et imaginer des univers à la fois ultra réalistes et totalement fantasmagoriques.

A-t-il choisi d'ailleurs?

Translated by Ann McGarrell

Kem Nunn is the author of a few rare and treasured crime novels -- five in all, of which four have been translated into French. Using tones that often differ from one another, he describes the miniscule lives of those who are left at the outermost edges of a dream California

The Hero is Tired

An interview by Corinne Naidet,

helped by Marie-Anne Lucas for the translation

Ian Rankin's character John Rebus only has a few days left before him. He does not suffer from an incurable disease, nor is he likely to be murdered by one of his many enemies, but in Exit Music (Editions du masque, 2010), he is about to retire. Ten days before the fateful date, Rebus and his team are faced with a new investigation : a Russian poet who opposed his country's government has be found beaten to death in a car park. Is it a political crime, an act of revenge, or a villainous murder?

 Still very rebellious, Rebus turns his hierarchy against him and is therefore suspended against all expectations. But they should have known that this cop was tenacious : with the help of his dear colleague Shioban Clarke, he is going to do his utmost to reveal the truth. All the more so because his personal enemy Ger Cafferty has just been attacked and is struggling between life and death.