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Inside the Black Horse by Ray Berard

(1 customer review)

$24.50

Pio Morgan is waiting outside a pub on a cold winter’s night. There is a debt he must pay and no options left.

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Description

Winner ‘Best Debut’ in the 2016 Ngaio Marsh Award for Best Crime Novel  and long-listed for the 2017 Dublin Literary Award.

What he does next drags a group of strangers into a web of confusion that over the course of a few days changes all their lives. There’s the young Maori widow just trying to raise her children, the corporate executive hiding his mistake, the gang of criminals that will do whatever it takes to recover what they’ve lost – and the outsider sent to town to try and figure out who did what. Time is running out for all of them as events take an increasingly sinister turn.

‘A crime story and a romance. Violence and compassion. Ray Bernard’s Inside the Black Horse is both a compelling journey into the dark world of gangs, drugs and killing and an engaging look at the mending of broken souls. An armed robbery that unexpectedly interrupts a drug deal sets the scene, thrusting good and evil against each other in a race to recover the loot. The reader is swept along and kept guessing until the final unravelling that is both surprising and simple.’
David Lomas
Award-winning crime/investigative journalist and investigator on the acclaimed TV series ‘Missing Pieces’ and ‘Lost & Found’

1 review for Inside the Black Horse by Ray Berard

  1. Craig Sisterson

    Ray Berard’s first published crime novel is a real cracker. An exciting beginning pulls the reader in, but it’s the nice touch Berard has for a fascinating and diverse cast of characters, along with the way he evokes rural and small-town New Zealand life, that blends with the action and mystery to really elevate INSIDE THE BLACK HORSE to must-read crime novel territory. I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started – Berard was a new author, a Canadian immigrant to New Zealand, setting a book in the central North Island. An area that combines tourist-enticing scenery with a blue-collar population and strong Maori influence.

    For me, INSIDE THE BLACK HORSE started well and got even better as it went along, with Berard layering in depth to the characters and story as the action unfolded. I was curious at first, then intrigued, then enthralled. There was a good sense of balance between character and plot, with some interesting underlying themes and a well-evoked setting, sociologically and geographically.

    This debut crime novel felt ‘well-rounded’, for want of a better phrase… In some ways INSIDE THE BLACK HORSE feels like a snapshot of modern-day New Zealand, populated by a range of authentic characters: hard-working people, blue collar and white collar, bludgers, gang members, cops and criminals. The weak and the wounded, the courageous and the strong. Those trying to do right by their family and those willing to sacrifice others to get ahead. Everyone trying to survive.

    Even when I thought I could see where INSIDE THE BLACK HORSE was going, plot-wise, Berard did a nice job at throwing in a few surprises, crafting an engaging story that felt fresh and unique even as it delivered the kinds of things fans of crime fiction expect and like to see from the genre. Great characters, good action, some nice prose. Highly recommended.

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