Tag: Irish fiction
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Book Review – The Language of Remembering by Patrick Holloway
When Oisin’s mother Brigid’s health begins to decline, he is drawn from Brazil back to Ireland with his wife and young daughter. As they work at building a new life, and he seeks to reconnect with his mother who has early onset Alzheimer’s, the faces and places around him begin to stir up echoes from…
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Book Review – I Want To Go Home But I’m Already There by Róisín Lanigan
When Áine’s flatmate Laura moves out to move in with her boyfriend, the natural progression is for Aíne to move in with her boyfriend Elliott. So begins the stressful search for a place to call home. They can’t believe their luck when they find a place, just about in budget, in a trendy neighbourhood; but…
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Book Review – Fun and Games by John Patrick McHugh
School is done for seventeen-year-old John Masterson, living on an island off Ireland’s west coast. The summer holidays loom ahead, full of potential and the uncertainty of what comes next. John is determined to make his mark on the football pitch, if he could just find his place in the team and play in the…
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Book Review – May All Your Skies Be Blue by Fíona Scarlett
When Shauna leaves Dublin City for the suburbs with her mother, Dean enters her life as part of a soon-to-be-inseparable foursome of friends navigating the trials and tribulations of adolescence. The spark of friendship quickly blossoms towards something more for Shauna and Dean but, with their own struggles and ties pulling them separate ways, they…
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Book Review – Mouthing by Orla Mackey
Mouthing is a series of confessional monologues, deftly sewn together, from voices hailing from one village in rural Ireland, which is ‘just about as good and as bad as you’ll get anywhere’. Divided into sections, illuminating different generations and points in time, each section explores a different story or situation from several different perspectives, inching…
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Book Review – The Heart in Winter by Kevin Barry
Our story begins in 1891 in Butte, Montana, a rowdy mining town high in the Rocky Mountains full of immigrants seeking their fortune, and many Irish among them. Here we meet dope-smoking, hard-drinking Tom Rourke, burdened by premonitions, full of despair and yet clinging to hope; a writer who writes songs for those in need…
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Book Review – Academy Street by Mary Costello
Academy Street by Mary Costello is a sweeping and deeply moving story, a short book that spans decades, taking us from 1940s rural Ireland to 21st century New York. When we meet Tess first, her childlike voice relays her confused feelings and observations of those around her as she copes with the death of her…
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Book Review – A Line Made by Walking by Sara Baume
Overwhelmed by urban life in Dublin, and life in general, artist Frankie, in her 20s, withdraws to live in her late grandmother’s rundown bungalow in the countryside. The novel moves back and forth in time, from her time in the bungalow to the city life she was fleeing to her rural childhood. With limited human…
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Book Review – Girl in the Making by Anna Fitzgerald
Jean is a gentle young girl growing up in 1970s and 1980s Dublin, living with her authoritarian and volatile father, her mother and siblings. She has a loving relationship with her mother until a new pregnancy leaves her exhausted. Jean’s solace at home is in her baby brother John and kind but meek Aunty Ida,…
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Book Review – The Island of Longing by Anne Griffin
One afternoon, Rosie looks out from an upstairs window as her teenage daughter Saoirse approaches home on her bike. Stepping away to finish up a few tasks before making her way down to greet her, Rosie is met only by her son when she gets downstairs. Saoirse’s bike is lying outside at the side of…
The Resting Willow 