Living Stream of Catholicism: View of the Catholic Church Through the Centuries by Eamon Flanagan (St Pauls, £7.95) The author sets out to highlight the living stream of Catholicism throughout the centuries and this he achieves in prose and poetry. At the outset he divides world history into a number of segments which will be…
Inside the Monkey House: My Time as an Irish Prison Officer by John Cuffe (Collins Press, € 12.99) John Cuffe dealt with some of the most depraved and violent people in this country during his 30 years as a prison officer, between 1978 and 2007. During his long years in Arbour Hill, where the worst…
Felix M. Larkin Ireland: The Autobiography – One hundred years in the life of the nation, told by its people ed. by John Bowman (Penguin Ireland, €25/£20) Shakespeare’s stage Irishman in Henry V, Captain Macmorris, famously asks “What ish my nation?” He answers his own question with these words: “Ish a villain, and a bastard,…
It was another week of controversies on hot social and political topics. News and current affairs programmes dealt extensively with the controversy about the relocation of the National Maternity Hospital (NMH) to a site at St Vincent’s. Inherent in most debates was the unchallenged assumption that there was a clash between best medical practice and…
Fast and Furious 8 (12A) The two most popular types of books on the market these days, I’m told, are cook books and diet books. I’m thinking of writing one called Cook It But Don’t Eat It. That should corner both markets. Our society is beset with contradictions. Every night on TV – justifiably –…
World Without End, by Thomas Keating OCSO and Joseph Boyle, with Lucette Verboven (Bloomsbury, £10.99) The author, a Trappist monk of the community at St Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass, Colorado, is already well known as a spiritual writer. His earlier books, Open Mind, Open Heart and The Mystery of Christ are familiar to many. He…
Sisters of the Revolutionaries: The story of Margaret & Mary Brigid Pearse, by Teresa & Mary Louise O’Donnell (Merrion Press,€14.99). This is an excellent account of the sisters of Patrick and Willie Pearse. Since the Pearse sisters died some of the politically motivated commentary on them ranged from the overtly negative to the gratuitously offensive. …
The Catholic Mom’s Prayer Companion. A Book of Daily Devotion, edited by Lisa Hendey and Sarah A. Reinhard (Ave Maria Press, $16.95; available online) There cannot be these days a more harassed set of people than the Catholic mothers of the world. This book is as the title suggests, of North American origin. That said…
Antoin Delap An Ghaeilge i Maigh Nuad, le Seán Ó hÉanacháin (Cló Iar-Chonnachta, €12) Is saothar an-chuimsíoch i seo múnlaithe ar thráchtas dochtúireachta a rinne an túdar. Clúdaítear corradh le dhá chéad bhliain de stair an choláiste inti. Tá’n túdar le moladh go mór as doimhneas agus iomláineacht a chuid taighde agus ach go háirithe…
THE WORLD OF BOOKS On Easter Monday I went with a friend to the regular monthly Book Fair in Dublin. This caters for many kinds of readers and collectors. Most of the books on offer are at very reasonable prices. Nothing here that would sell for more than a couple hundred euros – high enough,…
Brendan O’Regan
Aubrey Malone
Peter Costello