The Rag Tree: A novel of Ireland
by By Costello, D. P.
Category: Fiction , Thrillers , General

D.P. Costello’s spellbinding novel, The Rag Tree, breathes dark, vivid life into Ireland’s passionate legends.  Crisp and sharp-witted, Costello’s tale probes a modern Ireland torn between letting go of time-honored dreams and embracing the promises of a prosperous New Ireland.Even as they struggle against one another, the Irish Special Branch, the British Army, Scotland Yard, and the I.R.A. find themselves forced to ally against a common foe: The Rag Man. Mattie Joe Treacy is the Rag Man.  Engrossed in a desperate quest to find his missing father, Mattie Joe is cursed—by the playboy’s life of drink and carousing, by his family’s staunch adherence to Ireland’s old folk ways, and by a family curse hurled at his clan generations ago.  The Curse of the O’Neills, invoked by an angry cleric against Mattie Joe’s great-grandfather, declares that, “the eldest son will not survive the father.”  No Treacy son has since outlived his father, and Mattie Joe is next in line to die. Or is he?