The Truth Commissioner - Softcover

'The importance of this magnificent book is the beauty of its writing, the mastery of its telling. David Park is a great writer, that's the truth.' Glenn Patterson 'The Truth Commissioner is a fine, crafted novel, but it is also an important book ... his best writing to date ... He sets out to examine what it means to be alive - and does so in fictions that are subtle, understated, not without a hint of menace and always courageous' Eileen Battersby, Irish Times 'Edgy and compelling ... it approaches the mysterious with a kind of unsparing simplicity that yields moments of heart-shivering beauty ... this is a magnificent and important book' Joseph O'Connor, Guardian 'With guile and wonderful imaginative sympathy, Park stays afloat on the most treacherous of thematic currents ...We're reminded that with writers like David Park, the novel can itself be a kind of truth commission' New York Times

Henry Stanfield, the newly arrived Truth Commissioner, is troubled by his estrangement from his daughter, and struggling with the consequences of his infidelities. Francis Gilroy, veteran Republican and recently appointed government minister, risks losing what feels tantalisingly close to his grasp. In America, Danny and his partner plan for the arrival of their first child, happily oblivious to what is about to pull him back to Belfast and rupture the life they have started together. Retired detective James Fenton, on his way to an orphanage in Romania with a van full of supplies, will soon be forced to confront what he has come to think of as his betrayal, years before, of a teenage boy. In a society trying to heal the scars of the past with the salve of truth and reconciliation, these four men's lives become linked in a way they could never have imagined.