WELCOME TO MY BOOKSHELF

New York City, 2020. Darla Jacobson and her husband Theo Harper are about to leave their Brooklyn apartment building to spend the summer...

Great Granny Webster is a great little novel by Caroline Blackwood. In 1977, it was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and legend has it...

A young woman falls in love, marries, starts her career, becomes a mother, experiences the joys and challenges of parenthood with her...

I loved  The Bee Sting , which I read when it was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2023, and when my manager at the bookshop in Dublin...

“Joey felt that his romance with Daisy might ruin his life, but that didn’t stop him.” This line from the story Daisy’s Valentine opens...

Martyr!  is the debut novel by Iranian-American poet Kaveh Akbar and was one of last year’s buzzier books. I’m always curious about...

It has been a good while since I have found the time to sit down and write up my thoughts on a book. So the books I want to review keep...

Roland Mitchell‘s life can only be described as dull. He has dedicated his life to studying Victorian poet Randolph Ash, without making...

Isn’t it wonderful to have these authors you just feel entirely safe with? I can open any Toni Morrison book and I know for sure that I...

Gilead, 1956. John Ames is dying. In his seventies, the preacher knows his time on earth is coming to an end. He should be ready to meet...

After weeks and weeks of reading through and reviewing the Booker longlist, I spent a couple of weeks away from new literary releases and...

For nine months now, Tom Kettle has got to enjoy the quiet solitude of retirement after ending his career with the garda. From his rented...

Sunday has quiet day and currently eats only white foods. She cannot drink anything that is not fizzy and feels best burying her hands in...

Penang, 1921. Lesley and Robert Hamlyn are expecting an important visitor. “Willie” Somerset Maugham, who has been travelling through...

Nigeria – a country marked by extreme poverty and breath-taking wealth – is home to Eniola and Wúràolá, the two protagonists of Ayọ̀bámi...

Now that Gopi’s mother has died, it is up to her and her sisters to try and keep their father from falling apart. The only thing he still...

For some reason I expected not to enjoy this novel. Based on some blurb or review, I’d saved it in a similar category to Study for...

In the fictional town of Emory, Eoin takes a walk with his 13 year old son Jamie who can’t stop talking for a second, filled with...

A young woman moves to an unnamed Northern country to stay with her older brother as a housekeeper. Here she faces not only the strange...

I finished Prophet Song by Paul Lynch a few weeks ago, but I could not sit down and write up my thoughts about this novel right away,...