Peter CostelloLooking back over the past year of their reading and reviewing some of our regular contributors have selected what seem to them to be the best reading of 2013, a varied and wide-ranging choice.
Category: Books
Christmas books
Peter Costello examines the season’s offerings
A Necessary Weevil
Downturn Abbey, by Ross O’Carroll-Kelly, as told to Paul Howard (Penguin Ireland, €13.99)
Christmas books for children
Peter Costello looks at some offerings for younger readers.
Religious books for children
Christmas, like Easter, is a season of the year when parents and relatives make an effort to buy children something religious, such as the story of the Nativity or a life of Christ. It would be easy to recommend some books on the Nativity such as Brian Wildsmith's now classic books A Christmas Story with…
The light of other days
Donnybrook: A History (Ireland in Old Photographs) by Beatrice Doran (History Press, €17.99 / £16.99)
Portrait of the Marble City
Hidden Kilkenny: Knaves, Knights and Norman Abbots by John Keane (Mercier Press, €19.99 / £17.50)
The quiet eye of a Jesuit
Father Browne’s Laois edited by E. E. O’Donnell (Messenger Publications, €15.00 hb / £17.64)
The life and thought of Canon Sheehan
Canon Sheehan of Doneraile 1852-1913: Outlines for a Literary Biography by James O’Brien (Smenos, €23.00 plus p+p / £19.50 plus p+p ; ISBN-13: 978-0957552166; smenosbooks@yahoo.co.uk )
The Free State as it really was
Freedom to achieve freedom: The Irish Free State 1922-1932 by Donal P. Corcoran (Gill & Macmillan, €39.99/£35.00)