Irish Biography

`There followed a blue flash accompanied by a ver y bright magnesium-type flare ... Then came a frighteningly loud but rather flat explosion, which was followed by a blast of...

Micheal MacGowan was born in 1865 in the parish of Cloghaneely in the Donegal gaeltacht. He was the eldest of twelve children in a poverty-stricken family, living in a thatched...

Nowhere in the annals of sport is there a family so gifted. In 1982 the seven Casey brothers were inducted into the Irish Sports Hall of Fame, the only family...

First published in 1989 No Laughing Matter: The Life and Times of Flann O'Brien was the first full-length biography of Flann O'Brien. Rich in background, anecdote and social history, it...

This is a love story, set in the Irish literary world between 1986 and 2015. When they were first introduced by the poet Derek Mahon, Alannah Hopkin was an arts...

Memoir from the bestselling author of To School Through the Fields who has been described by The Observer as 'Ireland's Laurie Lee...a chronicler of fading village life and rural rituals...

Relax with Alice, sit and chat over a cup of tea, as she invites you into her life.See an old press overflowing with the linen collection of two generations, the...

Alice has known, loved, and lost many people throughout her life. Here she talks about her special people, her memory of what meant so much to her about them. She...

Born in Limerick in 1891, John Edward or 'Ned' Daly was the only son in a family of nine. Ned's father, Edward, an ardent Fenian, died before his son was...

Sean MacDiarmada moved in the shadows, ultra-cautious about what he committed to paper, aware that his letters could be intercepted by the police. Because of this, history has not allocated...

A fascinating examination of the life of Thomas Clarke, a member of the Fenians and a key leader of the Irish Republican Brotherhood in 1916. Clarke spent fifteen years in...

'A little gem of a book' Brendan O'Connor'Quietly devastating ... A touching testament to the relationship between one man and his dog' Business Post Tom Inglis and his Wheaten terrier...

In over forty years in medicine - seven of these as Master of the National Maternity Hospital - obstetrician Peter Boylan was at the births of more than 6,000 babies....

In 1895 twenty-six-year-old Bridget Cleary disappeared from her house in rural Tipperary. At first, some said that the fairies had taken her into their stronghold in a nearby hill, from...

1 January 2018 will be the 250th anniversary of Maria Edgeworth's birth. Valerie Pakenham's sparkling new selection of over four hundred letters, many hitherto unpublished, will help to celebrate her...

Outstandingly researched and richly illustrated, this biography gives a new and fascinating insight into the life of one who is already acknowledged to have brought laughter and enjoyment to so...

This work is a gathering of essays in tribute to the life and achievements of a remarkable Irish- born structural engineer Peter Rice (1935-1992), 'perhaps the most influential of the...

Jack Doyle was a 6ft 5in Irishman with a giant appetite for life. In 1933 he drew 90,000 to London's White City to see him fight and was making GBP...

From Ireland to London in the 1950s, Derry in the Troubles to contemporary, de-industrialised Manchester, Joyce finds the ties of place, family and the past are difficult to break. Why...

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE FOR NATURE WRITING - HIGHLY COMMENDED'A special, beautiful, many-faceted book' Amy Liptrot'A remarkable piece of writing . . . Luminous' Robert Macfarlane'Eloquent . . ....

When Moire O'Sullivan's husband, Pete, took his own life, she was left with a stark choice: to weep forever over the glass of milk that had just spilt or get...

Books about the work of James Joyce are an academic industry. Most of them are unreadable and esoteric. Adrian Hardiman's book is both highly readable and strikingly original. He spent...

'I Found My Tribe is inspiring, humbling and a picture of what love really looks like' Marian KeyesAn invocation to all of us to love as hard as we can,...

Farming has been in John Connell's family for generations, but he never intended to follow in his father's footsteps. Until, one winter, he finds himself back on the farm and...

The road to Croke Park can be a long one, but for Leitrim hurler Zak Moradi it was longer than most. Born in a refugee camp in Ramadi, Iraq, at...

'As skilful, stylish and pacy as one would expect from so adept a novelist' Sunday TelegraphEdna O'Brien depicts James Joyce as a man hammered by Church, State and family, yet...

Gerry's career came about almost by accident. His early days in Downpatrick were a struggle. His alcoholic father abandoned the family, his mother worked all the hours she could, providing...

What would you do to save your child? When Vera Twomey's daughter Ava was diagnosed with Dravet Syndrome, a rare form of epilepsy that causes multiple seizures a day, the...

What do you do with impossible dreams? When do you let them go? Niamh Shaw, scientist, engineer and performer, had always felt that something was missing in her life. Stepping...

In Martin McGuinness, The Man I Knew, Jude Collins offers the reader a range of perspectives on a man who helped shape Ireland's recent history. Those who knew Martin McGuinness...

The world is a mess and bestselling author and comedian Tara Flynn is raging. Well, sometimes. Mostly she's shocked, bemused, irreverent and wondering where the kindness went. Depends on the...

In this sequel to the hugely-popular This Man's Wee Boy, young Tony Doherty struggles to come to terms with the murder of his father, Paddy, on Bloody Sunday and the...

Beyond the Breakwater tells the story of Catherine Foley's transition from childhood into adulthood. She chronicles her family's journey from Waterford city to the Gaeltacht in 1970 and she monitors...

Well-known DJ Nikki Hayes has lived most of her life with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD), a serious mental disorder marked by a pattern of ongoing instability in mood, behaviour, self-image...