The Shankill Butchers

Book excerpt: The bestselling investigation of one of Northern Ireland's most brutal and infamous murder cases 'Makes for gripping but altogether terrifying reading' Washington Times 'Dillon is recommended reading for anyone wishing to understand the complexities of British-Irish politics. He stands alone as one of the most creative writers of our time' Irish Times ________________________________ 'This was the ultimate way to kill a man.' In the 1970s, in some of the most violent days of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, a group of Protestant paramilitaries embarked on a spree of indiscriminate murder which left thirty Catholics dead in the Shankill area of Belfast. Their leader was Lenny Murphy: a fanatical Unionist whose Catholic-sounding surname had led to his persecution as a child, Murphy swore revenge on all Catholics, and with his gang wreaked havoc onto an already fractured city. Not for the squeamish, The Shankill Butchers is a horrifying and detailed account of one of the most brutal series of murders in British legal history - a phenomenon whose real nature has been obscured by the troubled and violent context from which it sprang.