J. Anthony Gaughan This is an account of the revolutionary years in County Mayo from 1917 to the petering out of the Civil War in 1924.  The applications for pensions by veterans of the War of Independence are a key source for a study of this kind and the author makes good use of them. …

Read the rest of this entry

Peter Hegarty Trees and forests are the leitmotivs in a collection of elegant, informed essays each of which explores JRR Tolkien’s extensive imaginarium from a different perspective.  As Tolkie, whose work was permeated by the culture of early medieval England, was perhaps the mostly widely read Catholic author of recent times this book, though academic…

Read the rest of this entry

Columba McCann is currently the Master of Ceremonies for the Archbishop of Dublin. So he is in charge of the very grandest of religious ceremonies to be seen from time to time in the capital. But this book has another audience in mind, those working at the parish level to enhance the experience of the…

Read the rest of this entry

These two little pamphlets, which come with prayer cards as well, are intended as aide memoires or introductions to two of the most important figures in the Church in the 20th Century. The long pontificate of John Paul was so complex that it needed an extra volume for the New Catholic Encyclopaedia to deal with…

Read the rest of this entry