Last Sunday, the inimitable poet and musician Ciaran Carson died after an illness. Born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, into an Irish-speaking family, poet Ciaran Carson attended Queen’s University, Belfast. He held the position of traditional arts officer of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland from 1975 to 1998 and was appointed director of the Seamus…
Novels about the city of Belfast have a tendency to be set during the Troubles. It is too ingrained in the very fabric of life here to be otherwise. Glenn Patterson’s novel The International does something different. In January 1967, the inaugural meeting of the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association too place in The International…
Read more Northern Exposure: The International by Glenn Patterson (book 13 of #20booksofsummer)
Truth or Fiction by Jennifer Johnston continues my Northern Exposure series which highlight literature from Northern Ireland and is also, helpfully, one of my 20 Books of Summer! Jennifer Johnston’s fiction regularly deals with themes of memory, loss and an inability to come to terms with the past and Truth or Fiction is no different.…
Read more No 522 Truth or Fiction by Jennifer Johnston (Book 6 of #20booksofsummer)
Northern Exposure is my monthly series where I look at literature from Northern Ireland. I have three books by Northern Irish writers in my 20 Books of Summer stack and the first one up is Secrets and Other Stories by Bernard MacLaverty. Secrets and Other Stories is Bernard MacLaverty’s first short story collection, originally published…
Read more No 525 Secrets and Other Stories by Bernard MacLaverty (Book 3 of #20booksofsummer)
The title of Brian Moore’s sixth novel from 1968 could be a statement or a question, as his titular character battles with the notion of identity over the space of one day. I Am Mary Dunne, is a touching portrait of a neurotic woman trying to figure out who she was and who she has…
Read more No 539 I Am Mary Dunne by Brian Moore #readingirelandmonth19
