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2019 WAS A bumper year for Irish writing – and it looks like we have even more fantastic books to look forward to in 2020.
Here are our picks, with the caveat that there are even more great Irish books to come in the next 12 months.
Threshold by Rob Doyle
Published: January (Bloomsbury)
The author of Here Are the Young Men’s second novel focuses on a narrator who is “on a lurid pilgrimage for cheap thrills and universal truth”, and brings us from Paris to Berlin to “metaphysical awakenings in Asia”.
Grown Ups by Marian Keyes
Published: February (Michael Joseph)
The queen of Irish commercial fiction, Marian Keyes continues to write the kind of successful novels that other writers dream of. For her latest book, she brings us the Casey family, who start to unravel after one of the members gets a concussion and can’t keep her thoughts to herself…
A Thousand Moons by Sebastian Barry
Published: March (Penguin)
The two-time Booker Prize finalist returns with a novel set in Tennessee following the Civil War. It centres on Winona Cole, an orphaned child of the Lakota tribe, who is brought up by adoptive parents John Cole and Thomas McNulty (who we last met in Barry’s previous novel Days Without End).
Strange Hotel by Eimear McBride
Published: February (Faber & Faber)
In this slim novel, a nameless woman enters a nondescript hotel room she’s been in once before, many years ago. She goes on to occupy a series of hotel rooms around the world and the reader begins to piece together the details of what transpires in these rooms.
Apeirogon: A Novel by Colum McCann
Published: February (Random House)
The best-selling author focuses on the Israel-Palestine conflict for his latest novel, centring on two men: Palestinian Bassam Aramin and Israeli Rami Elhanan. When their children meet untimely deaths, the pair connect.
Terry Brankin Has A Gun by Malachi O’Doherty
Published: February (Merrion Press)
Journalist and writer O’Doherty, who is currently writer in residence at Queen’s University, Belfast, has set his debut novel during the post-Troubles-era Northern Ireland. The story is about a man called Terry Brankin, who is being investigated over an IRA bombing that killed a young girl. It’s said to explore the legacy issues of the conflict in the north.
Big Girl Small Town by Michelle Gallen
Published: February (John Murray)
Set in 2004 in a small town in Northern Ireland, Big Girl Small Town is about Majella, a woman who lives a quiet life where she keeps herself to herself. Others consider her odd, but she just likes a routine. When her grandmother is murdered, she is unwillingly thrust into the spotlight.
Our Little Cruelties – Liz Nugent
Published: March (Penguin)
Former stage manager and Fair City writer Liz Nugent is onto her fourth novel and she has quite the fandom supporting her globally. Her latest novel is about three brothers, Will, Brian and Luke, who “each betray each other, over and over, until one of them is dead. But which brother killed him?” We’re biting our nails already.
Laura Cassidy’s Walk of Fame by Alan MacMonagle
Published: March (Picador)
MacMonagle gained attention with his debut novel Ithaca. With this book he is writing about a young woman called Laura Cassidy, who’s always had her heart set on getting to Hollywood, but life has continued to throw curveballs her way.
Actress by Anne Enright
Published: March (Vintage)
The former Irish Laureate for Fiction returns with a stunning novel about a woman examining her relationship with her mother, who was a famous actress. But it’s about more than that, too – it’s about power, gender, sexuality and Irish society.
As You Were – Elaine Feeney
Published: April (Harvill Secker)
Galwegian poet and author Elaine Feeney’s debut has been lauded by Lisa McInerney, Mike McCormack and Sinéad Gleeson, so you know it’ll be much anticipated. It’s about a young property developer “with a terrifying secret” who is stuck in a failing hospital. The novel is said to explore “the darkly present past of modern Ireland”.
Exciting Times by Naoise Dolan
Published: April (W&N)
Dolan’s debut novel is set in Hong Kong, and is described as a “slyly humorous and scorchingly smart modern love story about three cynics”.
A Ghost in the Throat by Doireann Ní Ghríofa
Published: April (Tramp Press)
Ní Ghríofa is more commonly known as a bilingual poet, whose work is truly unique and captivating. Her prose debut with Tramp Press brings us the stories of two women – one an Irish noblewoman in the 1700s and the other a young mother in the contemporary world.
Oona by Alice Lyons
Published: March (Lilliput Press)
Intriguingly, Lyons’ debut was written entirely without the letter ‘o’ – now there’s a challenge. It’s a coming of age novel about an artist-in-the-making called Oona who lives in New Jersey and is about to take steps into a fraught adulthood.
What Irish books are you looking forward to next year? Tell us in the comments.
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Michelle O’Neill is absolutely correct in her call for this, but the North being the North; it is pretty obvious that the push from Michelle and the pushback from Arlene stems from something other than Coronavirus/public health.
@LangerDan: What about that funeral she attended not so long ago. Didn’t see much social distancing, did you? Plus did everybody there do self isolation after? Only thing she did with that statement was prove she is every bit hypocrite that she shamelessly branded to others.
@Richard Cronin: There has been more than enough hypocrisy to share around during this pandemic from many quarters. However it is important that we do not allow past hypocrisy create tunnel vision. I’d rather a hypocrite make a U-Turn than stick dogmatically to their original position. The issue here is, it makes perfect epidemiological sense to have an island wide solution to this; but the Northern parties are so entrenched in Green-Orange politics that such sound calls get proposed and opposed under a different light.
@LangerDan: so why are all the airports & harbors open? It’s not like the virus is going away anytime soon. Plus how is all this to be payed for? Most hypocrites are around for the sound bites but not for actual problem solving
@LangerDan: cash for ash foster would rather flood the place with unchecked tourists than listen to sf warning
She’s 100% right but unfortunately has undermined her own authority on Covid by attending Sinn Féin funeral that broke all common sense rules of social distancing.
@Brendan Walsh: hypocrisy in action
@Brendan Walsh: she had no choice, she was only following orders.
@John Mulligan: yaaaaawwwwwnnnn
@Richard Cronin: it is 14 days today since that funeral and as the numbers show, it was so well organised around social distancing regulations that not a single case of covid has been traced to it.
@M Bowe: actually 21 days.
@M Bowe: the west Brits are out in style
Poor Arlene. Would sooner see her people dessimated by a lethal virus than give an inch on her beloved Union.
@Toon Army: Maybe Michelle and colleagues should have thought of that before organising a mass attendance at a recent funeral.
@TL55: I don’t think they planned on a funeral??
Sinn Fein demanding internment for people entering Ireland. Detained without trial. Hilarious.
Does anyone really take this woman seriously?
@Brian Renaghan: Of course not Arlene Foster is a relic of the old era but luckily people are listening to Michelle O’Neill and taking what she says seriously.
When it came to closing and opening schools, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales took a different approach than England, so why are they insistant that they MUST now maintain the common travel area controls (or rather a lack of controls) with the rest of UK.
It really is hard to take anything from SF seriously. This type of proposal requires consensus from the executive and that is the forum for such an initiative. This solo run is just sectarian politics at its worst.
@camio55: do you even know what sectarianism is. Maybe check it out before using it!!!!!
@M Bowe: Sectarianism is a form of prejudice, discrimination, or hatred arising from attaching relations of inferiority and superiority to differences between subdivisions within a group.
Never thought I’d end up on Arlene’s side. Strange times.
Yet she went to a funeral where how many people attended? Calling for holding areas for people without due process? Congratulations you are every bit the hypocrite you shamelessly brand other politicians
@Richard Cronin: you are giving her too much credit. She doesn’t have any say in policy, she was appointed by the army council and is just a mouthpiece for them, the same as her clone in the south.
This is just an attempt by her handlers to leverage the covid crisis to suit their own agenda.
Sinner wants to stop traffic from Britain and align with Republic. Shocker
And the Republic of Ireland needs to protect itself from the spread of Covid-19 from Northern Ireland and vice-versa by limiting mass gatherings including attending IRA funerals, Michelle, Mary Lou and Pearse.
The porous border that the Unionists love could kill a lot of people !
have your say