With a short story writer of George Saunders’ outstanding calibre, it was a given that his novel debut would be stylistically impeccable. But there is so much more to Lincoln in the Bardo than literary showy offness. It packs an emotional punch that makes it one of the most moving books I have ever read. Telling… Read More Lincoln in the Bardo reviewed
Honestly, short story collections can be such stress-inducing things. You buy them with a view to reading them in their entirety. But then, more often than not, you pick out two or three stories with appealing titles and place the book on a shelf with every intention of returning to it. You never do return… Read More The Redemption of Galen Pike by Carys Davies reviewed
Yesterday evening I was the Cork Arts Theatre for a set of short plays, all with an Italian theme. One of the plays had been written by Brenda Donoghue from my writing group, her first ever stab at drama. To see a staged production of a play that we as a group watched evolve was very… Read More Lots of love for That’s Amore!
What is it about Pride & Prejudice that inspires so many homages? To my knowledge, there are no Wuthering Heights sequels, no spin-offs of Vanity Fair. Yet it seems we can’t get enough of the Bennets and their neighbours. The latest addition to the Meryton universe is The Longbourn Letters by Limerick-based writer Rose Servitova. It’s a… Read More The Longbourn Letters by Rose Servitova reviewed
Thinking about my review of The Reader on the 6.27 by Jean-Paul Didierlaurent, the phrase that continuously sprang to mind was ‘very French’. The blurb on the back cover (which I always avoid until after I’ve read a book) compares it to the film Amélie, which was precisely the comparison that kept coming to me. The Reader is similarly warm and… Read More The Reader on the 6.27 by Jean-Paul Didierlaurent reviewed
Heartbreaking and beautiful, ML Stedman’s The Light Between Oceans is one of those perfectly pitched, sweeping period novels you only come across every so often. The story begins in 1918, with young WWI veteran Tom Sherbourne recently returned to his native Australia after serving in the trenches in France. Though physically unmarked, he is tortured by his memories and… Read More The Light Between Oceans by ML Stedman reviewed
I’ve come to the conclusion that there are four types of books: 1) books you hate, 2) guilty reads you enjoy but know aren’t great in terms of writing, 3) books you can admire but don’t enjoy, and 4) books that you admire and enjoy in equal measures. Those are the ones that stand a chance of… Read More The Green Road by Anne Enright reviewed
Mickey Donnelly is a 10-year-old boy living in the Ardoyne area of Belfast at the height of the Troubles. The Good Son spans a difficult summer where he dreads starting secondary school in the autumn. He’s justifiably terrified at the prospect of having to go to brutal St Gabriel’s school because his mother can’t afford to send him to the more… Read More The Good Son by Paul McVeigh reviewed
Our Souls at Night is the final novel by American author Kent Haruf, published after his death from cancer in 2014. It’s a gorgeous book, deceptively simple in style, and the work of someone with a clear insight into what matters in life and what does not. Haruf’s writing is stripped bare, the resulting book concise and profoundly truthful. The story… Read More Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf reviewed
that time that time when and then there was that time when I went to see Les Misérables in the cinema, and I hadn’t seen the stage version so I wasn’t familiar with it other than hearing Susan Boyle sing I Dreamed a Dream on that terrible talent show and making me cry, so it took a… Read More Solar Bones by Mike McCormack reviewed
Word herding 