Say Nothing

A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland

hardcover, 464 pages

Published Feb. 26, 2019 by Doubleday.

View on OpenLibrary

5 stars (26 reviews)

“Masked intruders dragged Jean McConville, a 38-year-old widow and mother of 10, from her Belfast home in 1972. In this meticulously reported book — as finely paced as a novel — Keefe uses McConville’s murder as a prism to tell the history of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Interviewing people on both sides of the conflict, he transforms the tragic damage and waste of the era into a searing, utterly gripping saga.” – New York Times Book Review, Ten Best Books of the Year

From award-winning New Yorker staff writer Patrick Radden Keefe, a stunning, intricate narrative about a notorious killing in Northern Ireland and its devastating repercussions

In December 1972, Jean McConville, a thirty-eight-year-old mother of ten, was dragged from her Belfast home by masked intruders, her children clinging to her legs. They never saw her again. Her abduction was one of the most notorious episodes of the vicious …

3 editions

Review of 'Say Nothing' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

This book is excellent. It uses the disappearance of Jean McConville as a thread from which to hang the stories of former IRA members, historical context, and a lot of pain and suffering.

I found the IRA's unwelcome shift of a paramilitary organization fighting an unacknowledged war to a political party maintaining fragile, unsatisfying peace to be particularly interesting.

The bulk of this book is not about Jean McConville's disappearance and probably not a traditional 'true crime' novel. But her story and the story of her children are often brought back at the perfect moment to frame the historical narrative perfectly.

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