This week’s Reading Ireland Month prompt is New To My TBR!

WEEK FOUR: NEW TO MY TBR

After a month of Irish-related posts, is there anything that has caught your eye? In a month full of amazing Irish books, which ones have made it onto your TBR? Be sure to link back to the original blogger who posted about that book! 

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Despite reading a lot of Irish writers throughout the year I always love that you guys throw up some new reading options that I either hadn’t heard of, or haven’t yet got round to reading and this year is no different.

Here are a few books that have caught my eye over the last few weeks!

Modern Times by Cathy Sweeney (kim at Reading Matters)

I highlighted this collection last year in my forthcoming short story round-up but found that I was never particularly inclined to read it. Kim’s review has changed my mind and I definitely think this is a book that I would really enjoy.

Modern Times is a refreshing palate cleanser offering a quirky, inventive take on the short story. It is great fun to read! I hope Sweeney writes a novel next so she can give extended reign to that vivid imagination!

Kim at Reading Matters

The Statement by Brian Moore (Virginia at Rosepoint Publishing)

Despite barrelling through twelve of Moore’s novels for last year’s Centenary Readathon, The Statement is one I haven’t read yet. Virginia at Rosepoint Publishing really enjoyed it and has made me wish I’d included it in last year’s choices!

I thought this a very good political thriller. Good suspense, realistic atmosphere and believable events were what impressed me the most. The inner dialogue, the conversations, the nightmares, though, were what made it so good. 

Virgina at Rosepoint Publishing

Loving and Giving by Molly Keane (Madame Bibi Lophile Recommends

Molly Keane is a writer I really want to read more of. I loved Good Behaviour when I read it for Reading Ireland Month a few years ago and this review of Loving and Giving is a great suggestion of which Keane I should turn to next!

I enjoy her original phrasing and sharp observation, I even enjoy her awful characters (some of them anyway) when I’m in the right mood. I do find I need a palate cleanser afterwards though!

Madame Bibio Lophile Recommends

Saltwater in the Blood by Easkey Britton(Claire at Word by Word)

This book and author were completely new to me – a memoir charting Britton’s love of and relationship with the sea. I hadn’t heard of it before reading Claire’s great review but it is one I am definitely going to look out for now.

If you like reading books about the sea and particularly from a woman’s perspective, add this one to your list!

Claire at Word by Word

On Blueberry Hill by Sebastian Barry (Nancy Elin)

Nancy has been highlighting Irish theatre throughout the month and while Sebastian Barry is very well known for his novels, his plays are just as powerful. I haven’t yet read On Blueberry Hill but it sounds fantastic.

Goosebumps…when I finished the play. Oh, if you can find this story by Sebastian Barry in the library or better yet buy the Kindle version…please take the time to read this unforgettable play! Mr Barry is one of the best writers in Ireland…and he does not disappoint!

Nancy Elin

Fools of Fortune by William Trevor (Heaven Ali) and Other People’s worlds by William Trevor (JacquiWine’s Journal)

I’ve read a few of William Trevor’s later novels, but it was Ali and Jacqui’s reviews that led me to read The Children of Dynmouth this month, a novel which I found really impressive. On the strength of these two reviews I am now seriously contemplating a William Trevor Readathon for next year so that I can really delve into his work.

A novel of under two hundred pages, and yet the scope and the power of it really does belie its size. William Trevor’s writing is always so visual – leaving the reader with a myriad of images, as good as any film.

Heaven Ali on Fools of Fortune

All in all, this is a fateful tale – a story of shattered lives damaged by a fantasist/con man with little appreciation of his capacity to destroy. Nevertheless, there are glimmers of hope at the end amid the damage and destruction.

Jacqui on Other People’s Worlds

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So, these are just some of the titles that have caught my eye and I’m sure there will be a few more before the month is out. Have you spotted anything that has made you want to add some Irish flavour to your TBR this month?

Ireland Month Irish Literature #readingirelandmonth22 irishliterature