Sparks fly in this homoerotic dance of desire and betrayal, from a powerful new voice in Irish literature
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oxic masculinity, that repressed and repressive male energy that does so much to fuel brutality and abuse, sometimes finds itself on the brink of a vulnerable homoeroticism. In Djamel White’s debut novel All Them Dogs, a vividly propulsive neo-noir, two violent men discover that murderous desires can lead to love as well as death. This is a fast-paced crime thriller with a psychosexual twist, set in a dangerously Freudian arena of Eros and Thanatos.
On the run for five years after killing a man in a gang fight, Tony Ward has returned to the badlands of west Dublin under the protection of a local crime boss. Teamed up with tall and sullen enforcer Darren “Flute” Walsh, Tony is back on his home turf grafting a grim routine of collecting debts and drug dealer’s dues. Propelled through a world of old scores and hard knocks, our protagonist is a shark who has to keep moving simply to survive. But when he and Flute are called upon to kill a failing dealer, their brutal conspiracy becomes a visceral dance of desire and betrayal.
Djamel White is poised as a powerful new voice in Irish literature. His ability to conjure a downbeat world of rundown estates, boxing gyms and tattoo parlours is truly compelling, and there’s a real dynamism to his prose that combines street slang with poetic simile. Like its sharklike protagonist, the narrative rarely stops moving, and the strength of the novel lies in this episodic quality: the gritty realism of each scene is confidently portrayed and exuberantly realised.
