Why We Go to Mass, a comic book by Fr. Pat Seaver & Hugh McMahon (€5.99 postage included; for copies contact Paul Flynn at Kyle House, Henry St, Limerick, tel: 061-313377) Having to sit on so many Sundays to sit beside families with their small children, even some of communion age, are running around the aisles,…

Ireland’s Green Larder by Margaret Hickey (Unbound Publishing, £20 / €22; for copies contact support@unbound.com) Peter
 Hegarty   Historically we haven’t been particular about our food in this country. Food writer Margaret Hickey tells us that our forebears feasted on squirrels, foxes, pigeons, and swans. We were once even partial to porpoise. Her engrossing book leaves the…

This Family of Things by Alison Jameson (Black Swan Ireland, €12.60) The father of political philosophy, Thomas Hobbes, wrote in Leviathan that the lives of men and women were “solitary, nasty, brutish and short”. There are elements of these qualities in the characters of this very readable novel. At the outset the reader is introduced to William…

World of Books by the Books Editor   The other day emerging from my oculists in Grafton Street, I was trying out my new distance glasses. Coming towards me down Nassau Street was a No. 11 bus, bound for ‘Wadelai Park’. Thankfully I could see this quite clearly, but it set my memory going, for…

A Little Book of Encouragement edited by Vinita Hampton Wright, adapted from Sacred Space the Prayer Book (Messenger Publications, €9.95) The items in this book have been adapted from the prayer site, but this book is small enough to fit in a briefcase, pocket or handbag. Here are warm words of encouragement that will lift the…

Migration and the Making of Ireland by Bryan Fanning (UCD Press, €25) Joe 
Carroll   This is “the first comprehensive history of migration to and from the island of Ireland”, according to the publisher’s blurb. It certainly is comprehensive as it goes back to Neolithic times and up to more recent arrivals of Nigerians, Poles, Romanians and…

Memoir: Remembering  Krzysztof Joseph Romanowski by J. Anthony Gaughan (Kingdom Books, €15.00; available from Veritas branches) Today Polish is now the second most spoken language in Ireland (as Joe Carroll observes elsewhere on this page). Fr Gaughan’s new little book goes some way to explaining why this is. It consists of a brief, but moving memoir,…

Generous Love in Multi-Faith Ireland: Towards Mature Citizenship and a Positive Pedagogy for the Church of Ireland in Local Christian–Muslim Mission and Engagement by Suzanne Cousins (Church of Ireland Publishing, €6.00 / £5.00; available from the Theological Institute, Braemor Park, Dublin 14. ) The Rev. Suzanne Cousins was ordained to the Church of Ireland ministry in…

Journeying in Faith: A Walk with Christ by Cecil Hyland (Church of Ireland Publishing, €12.50) This book is something of a profession of Christian faith, in all its aspects, which Canon Cecil Hyland distils the experience he garnered from a variety of ministries in the Church of Ireland.  Like John Bunyan’s Pilgrim he has “earned the…

Our Father: Reflections on the Lord’s Prayer by Pope Francis (Rider, £9.99) This little book, which is issued to mark the fifth anniversary of the Pope’s election, is like so many of the publications which bear his name, drawn  from an interview, or rather conversation, with a friendly interlocutor. This was Fr Marco Pozza, a priest…