The Spinning Heart / The Thing About December

Donal Ryan

Tipperary-born novelist Donal Ryan’s novels offer insights into today’s Ireland, in the aftermath of the Celtic Tiger. The story-lines aren’t always pleasant, with recurring themes of government ineptitude and greedy, wily connivers, bullies and losers somehow made bolder by the Celtic Tiger myth that money buys happiness, or class. But while the writing is unflinching and unsentimental, Ryan also shows empathy for the victims and even for some of the perpetrators. 

Steerforth Press | $15 paper / 160 pages / 208 pages