Book picks similar to
A Telegram from Berlin by A. O'Connor
irish
irish-fiction
read-for-booksirens
book-sirens-arc
This Is Happiness
Niall Williams - 2019
Nobody remembers when it started; rain on the western seaboard is a condition of living. But now – just as Father Coffey proclaims the coming of the electricity – the rain clouds are lifting. Seventeen-year-old Noel Crowe is idling in the unexpected sunshine when Christy makes his first entrance into Faha, bringing secrets he needs to atone for. Though he can't explain it, Noel knows right then: something has changed. As the people of Faha anticipate the endlessly procrastinated advent of the electricity, and Noel navigates his own coming-of-age and his fallings in and out of love, Christy's past gradually comes to light, casting a new glow on a small world. Harking back to a simpler time, This Is Happiness is a tender portrait of a community – its idiosyncrasies and traditions, its paradoxes and kindnesses, its failures and triumphs – and a coming-of-age tale like no other. Luminous and lyrical, yet anchored by roots running deep into the earthy and everyday, it is about the power of stories: their invisible currents that run through all we do, writing and rewriting us, and the transforming light that they throw onto our world.
Skippy Dies
Paul Murray - 2010
With a cast of characters that ranges from hip-hop-loving fourteen-year-old Eoin "MC Sexecutioner” Flynn to basketball-playing midget Philip Kilfether, packed with questions and answers on everything from Ritalin, to M-theory, to bungee jumping, to the hidden meaning of the poetry of Robert Frost, Skippy Dies is a heartfelt, hilarious portrait of the pain, joy, and occasional beauty of adolescence, and a tragic depiction of a world always happy to sacrifice its weakest members. As the twenty-first century enters its teenage years, this is a breathtaking novel from a young writer who will come to define his generation.
Leonard and Hungry Paul
Ronan Hession - 2019
Who like to read. Who take satisfaction in their work. Who are resolutely kind. Leonard and Hungry Paul is the story of two friends trying to find their place in the world. It is about the uncelebrated people of this world. And it asks a surprisingly enthralling question: Can kind people change the world?
The Soldier's Song
Alan Monaghan - 2010
As Ireland stands on the brink of political crisis, Europe plunges headlong into war. Among the thousands of Irishmen who volunteer to fight for the British Army is Stephen Ryan, a gifted young maths scholar whose working class background has marked him out as a misfit among his wealthy fellow students. Sent to fight in Turkey, he looks forward to the great adventure, unaware of the growing unrest back home in Ireland. His romantic notions of war are soon shattered and he is forced to wonder where his loyalties lie, on his return to a Dublin poised for rebellion in 1916 and a brother fighting for the rebels. Everything has changed utterly, and in a world gone mad his only hope is his growing friendship with the brilliant and enigmatic Lillian Bryce. "The Soldier's Song "is a poignant and deeply moving novel, a tribute to the durability of the human soul.
Skin Deep
Liz Nugent - 2018
But her luck, and the kindness of strangers, have run out.The arrival of a visitor from her distant past shocks Cordelia. She reacts violently to the intrusion and flees her flat to spend a drunken night at a glittering party. As dawn breaks she stumbles home through the back streets. Even before she opens her door she can hear the flies buzzing. She did not expect the corpse inside to start decomposing quite so quickly . . .
Spill Simmer Falter Wither
Sara Baume - 2015
You're sellotaped to the inside pane of the jumble shop window. A photograph of your mangled face and underneath an appeal for a COMPASSIONATE AND TOLERANT OWNER. A PERSON WITHOUT OTHER PETS & WITHOUT CHILDREN UNDER FOUR.A misfit man finds a misfit dog. Ray, aged fifty-seven, ‘too old for starting over, too young for giving up’, and One Eye, a vicious little bugger, smaller than expected, a good ratter. Both are accustomed to being alone, unloved, outcast – but they quickly find in each other a strange companionship of sorts. As spring turns to summer, their relationship grows and intensifies, until a savage act forces them to abandon the precarious life they’d established, and take to the road.
Get Me to 21: The Jenna Lowe Story
Gabi Lowe - 2019
Jenna was diagnosed with pulmonary arterial hypertension, an extremely rare illness that, after a double lung transplant, ultimately led to her untimely death, four months before her 21st birthday.In this riveting and brutally honest memoir, in all its terrible truth, pain and beauty, Gabi Lowe shares her family’s extraordinary four-year battle to save Jenna’s life.Despite the tragic loss of Jenna, Get Me to 21 will leave the reader deeply inspired and reminded of the capabilities and depths of the human spirit. Embracing grit, resilience and never turning her back on the hope to save her daughter’s life, Gabi Lowe encourages us to believe that the ability to face darkness lives deep within us all.
Her Patriotic Duty
Rosie Meddon - 2020
When Esme learns she is adopted—from a working class family—she cannot allow Richard to marry so far beneath his station. Fleeing the life she knew, Esme finds work as a "decoy woman," testing British undercover operatives who may otherwise reveal secrets. But she still loves Richard—is she brave enough to go back to him and reveal the truth of her birth? A captivating World War II saga for fans of Rosie Archer and Annie Murray.
Cicada Conspiracy
V. Alpersson - 2016
No one knows who is behind it and why so much painstaking effort is dedicated to its design. After a young Internet entrepreneur is found dead in his San Francisco apartment, Stanford Computer Science Professor embarks on following a trail of clues left by a mysterious Dark Web puzzle. On his quest for the answers, he must confront the most powerful clandestine organizations and cold blooded killers who will stop at nothing to hide their dark secrets. The action unfolds against the backdrop of unsolved murders of young girls whose chlorine soaked bodies are found at various locations around the San Francisco Bay. This book will take you from the West Coast of the United States to other corners of the world in pursuit of the answers. You can follow the story to the coordinates in Stockholm, Berlin, and California through the links provided in the "Places" chapter at the end of the book. The coordinates of the locations in Manhattan and Sonoma County could not be disclosed. About the puzzles The puzzles used in this book are based on the actual Cicada 3301 riddles from different years. One notable exception is the "Stockholm Puzzle", which has a different, equally mysterious source. The puzzles in the book are easy to follow and do not require any technical background, just a sharp and curious mind.
Murder in County Tyrone
Padraig O'Hannon - 2015
Its tentacles reach the shores of America when John Costa, a once-prominent attorney who has all but given up on life, is questioned by the police. They’re asking about the person he’d least expect: the enigmatic Irish woman he secretly admires. His heart tells him she’s innocent, but new evidence hints at a sinister past. Will he be able to exonerate the woman of his dreams, or is he destined to become another victim? Learn the truth in this compelling tale of love, intrigue, and murder!
Bataan Uncensored
Ernest Brumaghim Miller - 1949
What happened next would scar survivors for the rest of their lives. On 9th April 1942, the prisoners were rounded up and forced to begin marching. This was the beginning of the infamous Bataan Death March. They were subject to cruel beatings and torture, were not provided with adequate food or water, and were forced to witness summary executions along the dreadful march that went on for over sixty miles. Those who survived with deep physical and psychological trauma. Yet, Colonel E. B. Miller refused to allow the lives his fallen comrades to be forgotten. So, even though he risked his own life, he kept notes of what happened. Humiliated by defeat, he obtained affidavits from men who were there, smuggled his history-in-the-making past Jap sentries, hid the notes in Jap prison camps, remembered and recovered them when victory came. Bataan Uncensored is the result of these remarkable notes that he made through the course of the war. It is the memoir not of a professional soldier, but instead of a citizen soldier, who as a member of the National Guard, was a commander of the 194th Tank Battalion. This book begins with how Miller, as a veteran from Mexican Border Campaign and World War One, came to be involved in the Second World War along with his fellow citizen-soldiers of the National Guard. It then covers the withdrawals into Bataan and how they became an integral part in that heroic siege against the overpowering Japanese hordes. But the book becomes especially vivid when Miller goes on to describe how he and his men gasped for strength on the Death March, how they elbowed death away in the confines of the hell ships, and how their sense of defeat fought with their American pride through the starvation and abuse of Jap prison camps. This book is essential reading for anyone interested in this tragic moment in American history and for anyone who wishes to discover how these remarkable men managed to survive and overcome the seemingly insurmountable odds that faced them. Colonel E. B. Miller had served in the Mexican Border Campaign and the First World War prior to becoming a commanding officer of the 194th Tank Battalion. He was held at Camp O'Donnell and Cabanatuan POW Camps in the Philippines before being sent to Japan. In Japan, he was held at Tanagawa, Zentsuji, and Rokuroshi POW Camps. He was liberated in September 1945. His book Bataan Uncensored was first published in 1949 and he passed away in 1959.
The Yellow House
Patricia Falvey - 2010
Eileen O'Neill's family is torn apart by religious intolerance and secrets from the past. Determined to reclaim her ancestral home and reunite her family, Eileen begins working at the local mill.
A Week in Winter
Maeve Binchy - 2012
When Chicky Starr decides to take an old, decaying mansion set high on the cliffs overlooking the windswept Atlantic Ocean and turn it into a restful place for a holiday by the sea, everyone thinks she is crazy. Helped by Rigger (a bad boy turned good who is handy around the house) and Orla, her niece (a whiz at business), Chicky is finally ready to welcome the first guests to Stone House’s big warm kitchen, log fires, and understated elegant bedrooms. John, the American movie star, thinks he has arrived incognito; Winnie and Lillian are forced into taking a holiday together; Nicola and Henry, husband and wife, have been shaken by seeing too much death practicing medicine; Anders hates his father’s business, but has a real talent for music; Miss Nell Howe, a retired schoolteacher, criticizes everything and leaves a day early, much to everyone’s relief; the Walls are disappointed to have won this second-prize holiday in a contest where first prize was Paris; and Freda, the librarian, is afraid of her own psychic visions. Sharing a week with this unlikely cast of characters is pure joy, full of Maeve’s trademark warmth and humor. Once again, she embraces us with her grand storytelling. This is the last book that Maeve Binchy wrote before her sudden death. As are all her stories, it is her trademark warmth, humor and the kind of characters that will make her books live on. It is a privilege to be able to share this book with readers.
Night Boat to Tangier
Kevin Barry - 2019
It is October 23, 2018, and they are expecting Maurice’s estranged daughter (or is she?), Dilly, to either arrive on a boat coming from Tangier or depart on one heading there. This nocturnal vigil will initiate an extraordinary journey back in time to excavate their shared history of violence, romance, mutual betrayals and serial exiles, rendered with the dark humor and the hardboiled Hibernian lyricism that have made Kevin Barry one of the most striking and admired fiction writers at work today.
Smile
Roddy Doyle - 2017
When you finish the last page you will have been challenged to re-evaluate everything you think you remember so clearly.Just moved into a new apartment, alone for the first time in years, Victor Forde goes every evening to Donnelly’s pub for a pint, a slow one. One evening his drink is interrupted. A man in shorts and pink shirt brings over his pint and sits down. He seems to know Victor’s name and to remember him from school. Says his name is Fitzpatrick.Victor dislikes him on sight, dislikes too the memories that Fitzpatrick stirs up of five years being taught by the Christian Brothers. He prompts other memories too – of Rachel, his beautiful wife who became a celebrity, and of Victor’s own small claim to fame, as the man who says the unsayable on the radio. But it’s the memories of school, and of one particular Brother, that he cannot control and which eventually threaten to destroy his sanity.