Read Ireland Book Reviews
Issue 417
Ireland: A View From Above by Christopher Moriarty and Antonio Attini
Large Oblong Hardback; 22 Euro / 30 USD / 15 UK; 280 pages, with full colour photographs throughout
Through stunning aerial photography of Ireland, this book captures the multitudes of colour and lushness of the country's natural landscape and heritage. All lovers of Ireland will enjoy this fantastic aerial trip over the green western outpost of Europe. The book offers readers hundreds of views over a sea of gentle hills and green meadows, desolate moors dotted with heather and gorse, and a jagged coastline tormented unceasingly by the ocean. Breathtaking images spring from the pages of this book, designed to capture an extraordinary plane journey over Ireland, and made even more captivating by the exceptional clarity and unusual perspectives of the photos taken by well known photographers. From the air, the reader can discover boundless landscapes and hidden corners revealed in all their stunning beauty.
Irish Houses and Gardens from the Archives of Country Life by Sean O’Reilly
Large Format Paperback; 22 Euro / 30 USD / 15 UK; 192 pages, with duotone photographs throughout [Add To Basket]
For over one hundred years, "Country Life" has been publishing definitive articles on the country houses of Great Britain and Ireland illustrated with specially commissioned photography by some of the century's preeminent architectural photographers, a practice which endowed the magazine with a unique photographic archive. Taken predominantly on glass plate negatives, the beauty and comprehensiveness of these illustrations is without equal. After the turn of the century, the growing interest in Georgian architecture led Country Life's writers to explore the unique contribution made by Irish architects and craftsmen to the development of the eighteenth-century house. As the pace of loss and destruction of so many houses quickened in the middle of the century, the magazine's photographs became an increasingly important, and often unique, record of what had gone. Here Sean O'Reilly, one of Ireland's leading architectural historians, has selected two hundred of the archive's most outstanding photographs and provided the essential historical background required for an appreciation of some of Ireland's greatest buildings, making this book not only an important survey, but also a portfolio of classic photographs of unrivalled beauty and significance.
Wexford: A Town and Its Landscape by Billy Colfer
Large Format Hardback; 50 Euro / 70 USD / 35 UK; 230 pages, with full colour photos and maps throughout
The book details the origins and growth of Wexford town since its establishment by the Vikings in the early tenth century. The influence of the broader environment on the foundation, expansion and economic development of the town is also examined. Periods covered include the Anglo-Norman, the Cromwellian settlement and eighteenth-century expansion. Detailed sections will include medieval churches, town wall and castle, the 1798 Rebellion and nineteenth-century church expansion. As a maritime town, shipping and trade for the different periods will also be examined. The growth of the town down to the present time will be analysed by using a series of maps and aerial photographs.Wexford town has a long and rich history, a varied archival record, and a powerful personality embedded in its tight streets. The landscape layers that underpin the town are painstakingly built up, period by period, component by component. The focus is different from a conventional history because the concentration is on helping the reader to understand how the landscape of the town is evolving. To achieve this understanding in this most cosmopolitan of towns, the book ranges far and wide - from the Viking north to the Mediterranean south, from privateers to navy commodores, from croppies to entrepreneurs.The history of the town leaps into vivid life through four hundred illustrations, including fifty new maps, historic prints, photographs and paintings. The result is a comprehensive treatment of the evolution of Wexford town, understood not just as an abstract pattern of bricks and mortar, but as a real place where people lived and loved, shopped and traded, fell and rose, all the time creating through their accumulated efforts a rich communal fabric. Wexford town has its own distinctive setting on its shallow harbour, its own way of doing things, its own accent, its own inheritance of streets, buildings and spaces. Together, they create the town, whose story is recorded here.
Dublin by Paul Baker
Hardback; 22 Euro / 30 USD / 15 UK; 135 pages, with full colour photographs throughout [Add To Basket]
This book is a visual celebration of old and new Dublin. Leading photographer Paul Barker shows us the graceful streets, squares and monuments of Georgian Dublin, now restored to their former elegance. He takes us to Dublin Castle and Trinity College, to the Abbey and Gate theatres, the Leopardstown Races and the Dublin Horse Show -- and, of course to the pubs that have been at the centre of Dublin's social life for centuries, and remain so today. He reveals also the confident and affluent modern Dublin, including the rejuvenated neighbourhood of Temple Bar on the south bank of the Liffey (Dublin's 'left bank') with its art galleries, bars, restaurants, clubs and shops.
Wild Dublin: Exploring Nature in the City by Eanna Ni Lamhna
Hardback; 25 Euro / 32 USD / 16 UK; 184 pages, with full colour photographs throughout
Dublin is not only home to a million inhabitants but is also residence for an exquisite array of creatures, flora and fauna. Minks in the Dodder, Whales on the coastline, Newts in Dundrum, Badgers in Rathfarnham, Otters in Ringsend - these are just some of the fantastic wild life you'll spot in the capital. Half of the bird species on the Irish list have been recorded here, as have more than a third of our wild plants. All of our terrestrial wild mammals, with just five or six exceptions, have been recorded inside the M50. This book shows you Dublin city's rich biodiversity of wildlife, with wonderful photographs by Anthony Woods, while the text, written by Eanna Ni Lamhna, provides a running commentary in her distinctive voice. "Wild Dublin" will inspire any reader - old or young - to go out there and see for themselves.
Dublin’s Magical Museums by Muriel Bolger
Narrow Slim Paperback; 11 Euro / 15 USD / 7 UK; 82 pages, with full colour photos throughout [Add To Basket]
Dublin’s Magical Museums – The Old and Not So Old is the latest Dublin pocket-sized guidebook from Muriel Bolger. Written in her inimitable and totally accessible style, Muriel explores the museums of Dublin – and there are almost forty of them – to find out all sorts of fascinating things from times past. She includes them all, from the popular to the lesser known. She reminisces among the old gramophone sets at Ye Olde Hurdy-Gurdy Museum of Vintage Radio and goes along to the latest Imaginosity, a children’s interactive museum which is founded on technology and state of the art discovery techniques. She delves into the world of banking, some 200 years of it, and learns about the development of traditional Irish Games at the GAA’s Croke Park. She traces the history of Dublin at the City Hall and close by, finds herself looking down on her city from the Gravity Tower in the Guinness Storehouse, having found out what really goes into the Black Stuff for which the capital is world known. Muriel’s research found her looking at puppets and wax models, trams and toys, photographs and prints, literature and heraldry, model railways and Masonry, as well as Georgian and Jewish history. The museums of Dublin captivated her and will enthrall every reader, whether a visitor to or resident of the Irish capital. The guide is illustrated with photographs and drawings. While targeted at the tourist market, it will also be of interest to people living within the Dublin area.
South Dublin – How to Get By on, Like, 10,000 Euro a Day by Ross O’Carroll-Kelly
Paperback; 9 Euro / 13 USD / 6 UK; 385 pages [Add To Basket]
The incomparable, irredeemable Ross O'Carroll-Kelly gives the ultimate low-down on the centre of the universe, South Dublin - a land of untold beauty and wealth, which boasts more yacht clubs per head of population than Monte Carlo, where girls talk like Californians, where rugby is the number one religion and where it's possible to buy a Cappuccino - at Champs Elysee's prices. The "Ross Guide to South Dublin" contains all you need to know about this extraordinary region, where it'll be soon be too expensive for anyone to live.
Favourite Irish Proverbs text by Jo O’Donoghue and Photography and Design by Lily Lenihan
Small Paperback; 10 Euro / 14 USD / 7 UK; unpaged, black-and-white photos throughout [Add To Basket]
Here is a delightful collection of proverbs - centuries-old folk wisdom from all parts of Ireland - in Irish and English. Each proverb is illustrated by a specially commissioned black-and-white photograph by emerging Kerry photographer Lily Lenihan.
Tactics of the Rich by Paul Overy
Large Format Paperback with Endflaps; 20 Euro / 28 USD / 14 UK; 174 pages [Add To Basket]
Aimed at those who truly want to be wealthy and who are prepared to make changes in their financial thinking and in their lives to achieve it, "Tactics" confronts and dismisses many of the myths and shibboleths of financial advice. "Tactics" is designed to give the reader sufficient detail on the processes and structures they can use to create as much wealth as is possible in their own circumstances. Far too often, in Paul Overy's view, people who try to create a little wealth do so in ways that frustrate their efforts - through their inability to identify the costs, the risks and the benefits of any financial action and through the lack of knowledge in how to structure their financial affairs. "The Tactics of the Rich" offers an easy-to-read and easy-to-follow solution - all the reader has to do is to apply it and make the necessary changes in their lives!
Eleven Houses: A Memoir of Childhood by Christopher Fitz-Simon
Paperback; 11 Euro / 16 USD / 8 UK; 290 pages [Add To Basket]
Christopher Fitz-Simon was born into an extraordinary Irish family, with Daniel 'The Liberator' O'Connell on one side and Ulster Protestants on the other, and his childhood coincided with the Second World War - or, as it was known in the southern Irish state, the Emergency. "Eleven Houses" is a crystalline memoir of his family's odd progress through those odd years, an account by turns hilarious and heartbreaking. Christopher's father was an officer in the British army, serving in the middle east when war broke out, and the family home in these years was in fact a series of homes in every part of Ireland.Christopher's mother, a restless, unsettled woman, moved him and his brother constantly: they stayed in the homes of relatives (including Annaghmakerrig in Co. Monaghan) and friends (Maidenhall in Co. Kilkenny); they were paying guests in country houses; and they lived in military accommodation in Co. Down. For long periods they were not enrolled in school, and the commencement of formal education proved a shock after years of the freedom of houses, orchards, lanes and fields. Drawing on his extraordinarily vivid recall of the places and feelings of those years, Christopher Fitz-Simon tells a story of growing up that is also, in effect, a story of various hidden Irelands during the twilit years of the war. Funny, moving and sharp, it is a childhood memoir like no other.
Rachel’s Favourite Food at Home by Rachel Allen
Large Format Trade Paperback; 17 Euro / 24 USD / 12 UK; 240 pages, with full colour photos throughout [Add To Basket]
If you've ever prayed for kitchen inspiration, Rachel's Favourite Food at Home serves up the answers. Brand new in paperback and including new recipes, this beautifully illustrated cookbook offers the delicious, inspiring and easy-to-follow recipes for which Rachel Allen has become famous. Rachel's Favourite Food at Home draws on international influences, classic regional fare and good old family favourites to provide creative options for every occasion, whether planning a simple family meal, hosting a festive dinner for the entire clan, squeezing in a sneaky romantic meal for two, heading out for a glorious picnic, chilling out on the sofa with your favourite comfort food, or spending time baking muffins with the kids. Chapters include: Easy Family Food Sweet Celebrations Picnics and Days Out Food for Children Extended Family Meals Dining Al Fresco Home Cinema Big Celebrations Edible Gifts Just Like Mum Used to Make.
Souls of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Pepe Charles and Honey Dew II by Damien Tiernan
Paperback; 11 Euro / 15 USD / 7 UK; 313 pages with an 8-page black-and-white photo insert [Add To Basket]
In January 2007, within the space of only six days, three large fishing boats - the Pere Charles, the Honey Dew II and the Renegade - capsized and sank off the south east coast of Ireland. There were eleven crewmen on board the three vessels. In a tragic week, seven fishermen lost their lives in storm-force winds and waves.In Souls of the Sea, Damien Tiernan gets to the heart of the tragedy that stunned Ireland and made headlines around the world. He talks to the families of those who drowned, as well as to the survivors from the sunken boats; to the rescue crews and weather forecasters, and to the ordinary people who turned out in their hundreds to search the shoreline for clues as to what happened.A vivid picture emerges of brave and resourceful men and women who continue to forge unique communities in the face of adversity.Souls of the Sea is a memorial to the seven men who were lost.
Please note: Prices were correct at time of original posting but are subject to subsequent change without notice.
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