A Month by the Sea: Encounters in Gaza by Dervla Murphy (Eland, £12.99)

Living with Grief: Walking the Spiral by Bairbre Cahill (Redemptorist Publications, £7.95)

The death of Brian Friel at the age of 86 marks an epoch in Irish literature. Along with Seamus Heaney, Brian Friel was an Irish writer with an international reputation, who was never tempted into exile. Friel was one of the group of Ulster writers and critics who came to prominence in the 1960s, and…

Father Browne’s Dublin Photographs 1925-1950 edited by E. E. O’Donnell SJ (Messenger Publications, €14.99)

In the Shelter: Finding Welcome in the Here and Now by Pádraig Ó Tuama (Hachette Books Ireland, €16.99)

Books Editor The other week our reviewer discussed how Mártin Ó Cadhain, in writing his celebrated novel Cré na Cille, resorted to creating new words in Irish to express his meaning. In this he had many precedents, such as William Shakespeare. But words are odd things.  Recently it was reported that the rapper Eminem has the…

The Murder of William of Norwich: The Original Blood Libel in Medieval Europe by E. M. Rose (Oxford University Press, £16.99)

News of the visions at Knock first came to the attention of the wider world through the medium of journalists anxious to report on what many thought might be an Irish Lourdes. This had an unfortunate outcome in many ways. Veteran journalist Andrew Dunlop, an Ulsterman, in his memoirs Fifty Years of Irish Journalism (Dublin,…

Roots of Faith: A Journey of Hope by Fr Ray Flaherty and others (Headford Parish Committee, €20 plus €5 p+p, from the parish office, St Mary’s Church, Headford, Co. Galway; email: headfordchurch@gmail.com)

The passing of the Rev. Prof. Sir Owen Chadwick at the great age of 99 has brought a remarkable career to a close. Owen Chadwick was one of the most distinguished historians of Christianity in the last 60 years or so, whose works have left a permanent impression on historians, theologians and general readers.   …