Read Ireland Book Review
Issue 190
New Irish Fiction
The Visitor by Maeve Brennan
Hardback; 9.99 IEP / 11.50 USD / 8.50 UK / 12.70 EURO; New Island, 86 pages [Add To Basket]
The revival of the work of Maeve Brennan, who died in obscurity in 1993, has won her the reputation as a classic 20th century Irish writer. Now the significance of Brennan's work has been further heightened by the chance discovery of this novella, written in the mid-1940s but until now unknown and unpublished. Recently found in a university archive, it is, quite simply, a masterpiece. It is the tale of Anastasia King, a young Dublin woman haunted by the break-up of her parents' disastrous marriage, and her decision to follow her mother to Paris. Now, home in Dublin for the first time in six years, with her mother dead, Anastasia slowly comes to see the price she will have to pay: exile in the place she once called home. This novel is an understated work of genius, meticulous, haunting and unforgettable.
A Carra King by John Brady
Trade Paperback; 15.00 Euro /13.50 USD / 10.00 UK; Orion, 365 pages [Add To Basket]
When an American tourist is found dead and stuffed into the boot of his car, Inspector Matt Minogue finds himself in charge of the ensuing furore. Not only was the victim a tourist, but also the son of US multimillionaire Johnny Leyne, a patron of many Irish-American causes. In the absence of his Chief Inspector, Minogue must clear this one up quickly - just to avoid the fall-out. But a simple random murder is quickly ruled out with the discovery that one of the victim's last known contacts - a curator at the National Museum in Dublin - is also missing. Soon, Matt finds a link between these crimes - a mysterious archaeological site called Carra Fields that threatens to rewrite Irish history.
Hope by Mary Ryan
Hardback; 20.00 IEP / 24.50 USD / 17.50 UK / 25.40 EURO; Headline, 470 Pages [Add To Basket]
In 1869 Tom Walsh and his sister Maria abandon their beloved Ireland and immigrate to America. They leave behind an Ireland ravaged by famine and exploitation, her people demoralized by the cruel legacy of the Penal Laws, and decimated by starvation and emigration. America is the land of opportunity, where railroads are moving the frontiers ever westwards. Together, Tom and Maria begin a journey that will take them across the prairies of the New World towards Colorado and, eventually, to a great gold mine that will make Tom rich beyond his wildest dreams.
Thirty years later, Tom is one of the world's wealthiest men, a friend of presidents and royalty, a US commissioner to the 1900 World Trade Fair, and a lavish host in one of Washington's foremost mansions - but he still returns on a visit to Ireland in hommage to his past.
Fortune, however, has her price. Tom's daughter, Evalyn, daughter of the heir to the Washington Post, buys the world's most famous gemstone, the Hope Diamond …
In this book best-selling author Mary Ryan takes the reader through the misery of famine-stricken Ireland, the anguish of the emigrant ship, the uphill road to fortune, and the lives of the super-rich in the early 1900s in this passionate and powerful epic saga, based on the true-life story of Thomas F. Walsh, her great-grand uncle who made his fortune in the goldmines of Colorado.
What She Wants by Cathy Kelly
Paperback; 10.00 IEP / 12.00 USD / 8.50 UK / 12.70 EURO; HarperCollins, 656 Pages [Add To Basket]
This new contemporary romance novel by the best-selling Irish author follows the fate of four Irish women: Hope, Sam, Virginia and Nicole. They all thought that they had their lives mapped out. Hope thought she would still be slogging it out as a working mum, snatching quality time with her husband Matt and her two small children. Her sister Sam was going to be the acclaimed boss of a record label, turning heads as the toughest, most brilliant music mogul in Ireland. Virginia would be planning their dream retirement home with her beloved husband Bill and doting on their little granddaughter. And wild child Nicole reckoned she'd still be out singing karaoke, partying like mad and trying not to get fired from her boring job for making too many personal phone calls. But destiny has other plans for them …
Playing with Fire by Mary Larkin
Hardback; 16.99 IEP / 20.00 USD / 14.99 UK / 21.60 EURO; Little Brown, 470 Pages [Add To Basket]
In Jim Brady, Susan Cummings has found a man who is perfect marriage material: tall, good-looking, decent and caring. But love never runs smooth, and in Belfast in the late 1950s it is as rough as it is possible to be. For Jim is a Catholic, and Susan knows that her Protestant parents will never accept such a union. However much their feelings blossom, Susan and Jim know theirs is a relationship that is doomed from the start. Even so, when Jim decides that breaking up is the only way forward, Susan in heartbroken. And when you heart is broken, anything can happen. And it does in the form of Graham Robson, her sister's boyfriend. For a brief moment despair is replaced by desire. It is a single night that changes her life: when Susan discovers she is pregnant, she flees her family's reaction for England. When she returns to Belfast on hearing terrible news from home, she doesn't know just how her future will be played out. But she knows one thing: she is playing with fire!
Friends Indeed by Rose Doyle
Paperback; 12.50 IEP / 14.50 USD / 10.50 UK / 16.05 EURO; Hodder, 472 Pages [Add To Basket]
This historical romantic novel is set in 19th century Dublin, a city riven by the green of an emerging middle class and the unspeakable poverty of the poor. Alicia Buckley and Sarah Rooney, growing up there, embody that divide. But despite their different backgrounds, the girls enjoy an extraordinary friendship, so when Sarah falls pregnant, and is thrown out by her father, Allie doesn't think twice about joining her friend in exile. Neither woman is prepared for the deprivations she will face.
Pursuing Sarah's soldier lover, they make their way, with baby James, to Kildare. There they become part of a community of outcast women, known as the Wrens of the Curragh, who live rough, savage lives on the outskirts of the army camp. Their numbers include prostitutes, ex-convicts and alcoholics; the life is crude and poverty-stricken, often drunken and wild, the women reviled in the local town and forbidden the camp except on market days. But there is also sharing and trust, and, through her work as the community's doctor, a liberation for Allie from the stifling expectations of her family.
The respite is short-lived. Tragedy and death force Allie and Sarah to turn their backs on Ireland to make new lives in America. But a final twist of fate means that only one woman will reach that brave new world.
The Visitors' Book by Mary Rose Callaghan
Paperback; 8.99 IEP / 10.50 USD / 7.50 UK / 11.50 EURO; Brandon, 285 pages [Add To Basket]
Peggy, who's Irish, and Charlie, American, have moved from New York to Dublin, in search of a more peaceful life. Charlie is having a mid-life crisis and has romantic illusions about living in the west; Peggy is more practical and fears returning to the grey streets of her youth. They buy a small house in Dublin 6, and get busy renovating it. But Peggy is certain that Charlie is having an affair with a sexy young poet, and in desperation she turns to her diary, narrating the story of the characters on her own street and their first year in the house.
Their troubles really begin when friends and relations from America start to visit. Charlie's quarrelsome step-parents want to see the Aran Islands; his romantic Southern cousin wants to marry an Irish redhead; his brilliant Texan grandson is besotted with Shelley, while his hyper-active ex-wife want to rope them into making a film. And these are only a few of the visitors, all of whom are in search of happiness, which Ireland must miraculously supply. Reality, of course, turns out to be different from the dream, not just for the visitors, but also for Peggy and Charlie.
The Thing He Loves by Elizabeth Wassell
Paperback; 8.99 IEP / 10.50 USD / 7.50 UK / 11.50 EURO; Brandon, 285 pages [Add To Basket]
Torments by a cruel family background, an aspiring artist leaves New York to start a new life in the extreme south of Ireland where, amidst the ruggedly beautiful scenery of West Cork, an international community of artists and writers flourishes. As Gabriel settles in, it seems that he seeks approval, yet soon he is seen as someone to be avoided, by all but Lottie, the local girl with whom he embarks on a torrid affair. At the same time Tony, also an artist, fall in love with Fleur Penhalligan, a renowned painter considerably older than him. Both couples explore the dark side of passion, one couple growing through the journey, the other engulfed by the darkness they have invoked. This haunting novel explores extremes and contradictions. The writing is richly evocative of the sounds, textures and aromas of West Cork's countryside, its pubs and shops, its literary and artistic milieu.
The Congress of Rough Riders by John Boyne
Hardback; 15.00 IEP / 18.00 USD / 12.50 UK / 19.10 EURO; Weidenfeld, 328 pages [Add To Basket]
Dublin-born novelist John Boyne has chosen the life of Buffalo Bill as the subject for his second novel. William Cody grows up surrounded by his father's tales of Buffalo Bill, to whom he is distantly related, and his fantasies of the Wild West. Though he escapes his heritage by fleeing abroad and starting a new life for himself, he finds that he is always drawn back to his ancestry. When his father proposes that together they should recreate Buffalo Bill's stage show, 'The Congress of Rough Riders of the World', for a contemporary audience, William refuses to have any part in it. When tragedy strikes, however, it is to his father that he eventually returns. This engrossing novel spans centuries and continents, and is played out against the background of the American Wild West.
At Ruby's by Frank Delaney
Trade Paperback; 13.50 IEP / 16.50 USD / 10.99 UK / 17.15 EURO; HarperCollins, 311 pages [Add To Basket]
This is a compelling psychological thriller. Like all Delaney's novels, it rests on several layers: a thriller with profound themes; a contemporary, sometimes playful, novel with homage to the mood of the 1930s spy-and-cabaret writers; a love story full of desperate, touching passion.
Architect Nicholas Newman has married Claire, younger than him, frail and beautiful but with a dangerous history. Passionately, watchfully in love with her, he struggles to tell her of his feelings. Claire feels destabilized by her jealousy of the women he has known - notably Ruby Harmer, the Belgravia nightclub owner, a lover from Newman's former, wilder life. Ruby now exhibits a claim to Newman that he regrets and she draws him into something deeper and worse than he has yet known. Meanwhile, a boardroom argument provokes an unsolved murder, and Newman finds his client, the enigmatic and vicious Richard Strafe, involved in evil that comes straight from today's headlines. Absorbing, passionate and riven with tension, this novels punch with force as Newman is forced by shock after shock into a vortex of choices that determine his bravery - or his cowardice.
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