Apr 8, 2021
NORTHERN HEIST is a first novel by Richard O’Rawe, who as an IRA recruit robbed a Northern Bank branch in Mallusk outside of Belfast in 1977. Captured immediately afterward, he was sentenced to eight years at Long Kesh/Maze prison. While there, O’Rawe became the Public Relations officer for the prisoners who were participating in what would become their world-famous hunger strike, in which 10 of the striking prisoners ultimately died.
In this interview, O’Rawe talks to Michael Barson, Senior Publicity Executive at Melville House, about his decision to become an author and write a novel about a Belfast bank robbery. According to the Wall Street Journal, the book’s “deeds and details seem as real as a smashed kneecap, while its stopwatch tension, heightened by present-tense voice, is reminiscent of such classic caper films as Rififi and The Asphalt Jungle."