Gregg’s new book is not for the faint-hearted

GREGG Murphy describes his new novel The Lookers as a darkly thrilling tale of youth interrupted.

Gregg, best known for watching television with his friends in Tinryland on the hugely popular programme, Googlebox, likes to write about the dark underbelly of society. His new book is definitely not for the faint-hearted, then.

“It goes from being fairly distressed to full-on horror by the end of the book,” he explained.

It’s set in the townland of Linkardstown, near Tinryland, and features four friends who unwittingly become involved in something very scary indeed.

A synopsis of the story is that it’s set in the summer of 1998, a time that should be full of carefree adventures and childhood memories for 12-year-old Lenny and his trio of friends – Ricky, Saoirse and Daryl. But when a young girl vanishes without a trace and a mysterious figure appears in the fields, their world fractures into something dark and unexplainable.

As fear and suspicion grip the village, a new teacher arrives at school and with him comes a strange energy. Tensions build, secrets stir and the line between myth and memory begins to blur.

What follows in a gripping and deeply human coming of age mystery, charged with eerie folklore, emotion, horror and raw adolescent honesty. The gang must navigate friendship, fear and the idea that maybe the real monsters aren’t the ones hiding in the woods.

“It’s fairly obviously a horror story so it’s not for children but maybe a mature teenager could read it. I’m a big fan of Stephen King, Dan Brown and Thomas Harris,” continued Gregg who, apart from his appearances on Googlebox, is a lecturer in SETU.

It’s self-published and Gregg deliberately left some mistakes in it so that people would know that it definitely wasn’t written by Chat GPT.

He also used his skills as a lecturer in digital marketing and media to market the book during the summer months, putting up puzzles on Instagram and asking people to solve them. The final puzzle was a video which, if played backwards, contained a number that would unlock the code to the book.

“It was fun seeing if people could figure it out, but I might have made it a little too hard!” he said, adding that he’ll continue to write and, maybe, a third novel might come out of it. “I like being busy so I wrote it in the evenings, I’d get home and throw myself into it. My first book, ‘Legends of Old’ sold quite well but writing is a passion project. It’s a hobby at this stage. I like writing stories in the evening. Sometimes they grow into longer stories, sometimes they don’t, we’ll see.” The Lookers is available now on Amazon, priced at €11.11 on https://tinyurl.com/ydhvawkn