Winner of the Arthur Ellis Award, Best First NovelFather Brennan Burke is the main suspect in the murder of a young woman. Defense attorney Monty Collins steps up to defend him, but realizes the only way to exonerate him is to dive into the secrets of his past …Be careful what you wish for, his mother used to say. Yet how many times, in his twenty years defending the underprivileged, has Monty Collins wished for a client who is intelligent,...

From Arthur Ellis Award–winning author Anne Emery comes a “winning mystery [that stands] on its own.” — BooklistIt’s 1989. The Troubles are raging in Ireland, bombs exploding in England. In this prequel to the Collins-Burke series, Father Brennan Burke is home in New York when news of his sister’s arrest in London sends him flying across the ocean. The family troubles deepen when Brennan’s cousin Conn is charged with the murder of a Special Branch detectiv...

From two-time winner of the Arthur Ellis Award comes a new mystery that will keep readers guessing along with Collins and Burke. From Halifax, Nova Scotia all the way to Berlin, Germany, Father Brennan Burke searches for answers in the murder of a parishioner and finds that she was a woman with many secrets in her past.Father Brennan Burke is coming off a rough stint in Belfast and he’s been trying to obliterate those memories with drink ever since. His troubles in...

Lawyer and bluesman Monty Collins is used to defending murderers, and occasionally investigating murders himself. But he can’t round up the usual suspects this time. The blood-drenched body of Reinhold Schellenberg, a world-renowned German theologian, has been found on the altar of an old church in Halifax, Nova Scotia, during Vespers on Saint Cecilia’s day. The man has nearly been decapitated. The controversial priest, once a top insider in the Vatican, was known to provoke strong feeling...

Go back to the beginning of the Collins-Burke mysteries with this collection, which includes the first three novels in the award-winning series: Sign of the Cross, Obit, and Barrington Street Blues.Sign of the Cross: This winner of the Arthur Ellis Award for Best First Novel introduces lawyer Monty Collins who meets Father Brennan Burke when he represents him: the priest is the lead suspect in the murder of a young woman. Conflict between lawyer ...

Theres a killer on the premises of Christy Burkes pub in Dublin, according to graffiti spray-painted on the wall. Father Brennan Burke, Christys grandson, is asked to investigate the vandalism. Brennan has been tending bar a bit himself and is not all that keen on probing into the lives of his clientele. But he has little choice once a body is found and the property investigation becomes a murder inquiry.The pubs current owner, issuing orders from his cell in Mountjoy Prison, wants...

This popular series “gets better with every book” (Globe and Mail)Father Brennan Burke’s patience is tested to the limit when a young woman announces to the world that the Virgin Mary has appeared to her in his churchyard, and hordes of pilgrims, souvenir hawkers, and reporters converge on the scene. But, as unwelcome as these guests may be, they pale in comparison to yet another aggravation in Father Burke’s life, a controversial talk show host who clashes with Burke the ...

Winner of the 2019 Arthur Ellis Award for Best Crime NovelAs 1995 dawns in the North of Ireland, Belfast is a city of army patrols, bombed-out buildings, and “peace walls” segregating one community from the other. But the IRA has called a ceasefire. So, it’s as good a time as any for Monty Collins and Father Brennan Burke to visit the city: Monty to do a short gig in a law firm, and Brennan to reconnect with family. And it’s a good time for Brennan’s cousin Ronan t...

An unsolved murder investigation in 1970s Ireland from “one of Canada’s finest novelists.” — Ottawa Review of BooksShay Rynne grew up in the Corporation Flats — public housing — in Fenian Street, Dublin. He has always toyed with the idea of joining the Garda Síochána, the Irish police. But in the early 1970s, young fellows from the tenements of Dublin have not been welcomed in the police force. When his friend Rosaleen is killed and the case goes unsolved,...

Two men are found dead outside a bar. Helped by Father Brennan Burke and hindered by his femme fatale law partner, Monty Collins investigates people desperate to cover up a series of parties that got way out of hand.A rich man and a poor man are found dead from gunshot wounds outside a seedy bar on Barrington Street in Halifax. The police declare it a murder-suicide, but bluesman/lawyer Monty Collins — hired to represent the victims’ families — suspects it’s a doub...

Two-time Crime Writers of Canada Award–winning author Anne Emery is back with another mystery“[Anne Emery] really is a fine writer; not just a good storyteller but a stylist as well: every word of her prose feels carefully chosen for the way it interacts with the words around it.” — BooklistFather Brennan Burke’s father, Declan, gathered up his family and fled Ireland under the cover of night four decades ago after disobeying an or...

Award-winning author Anne Emery is back with another Collins-Burke team-upThe students at Father Brennan Burke’s choir school have written a two-act play about the Halifax Explosion of 1917. The last thing Burke expects is a series of threats against his school and his students, designed to make sure they never perform act two. Then the body of a young woman, Trudi Ebbett, is found strangled in Halifax. A junior hockey player, a friend of one of the students, is th...