April Read: Bailieborough Reading Group

Carry me down by M.J. Hyland
Ireland, 1971. John Egan is a misfit, 'a twelve year old in the body of a grown man with the voice of a giant who insists on the ridiculous truth'. With an obsession for the Guinness Book of Records and faith in his ability to detect when adults are lying, John remains hopeful despite the unfortunate cards life deals him. During one year in John's life, from his voice breaking, through the breaking-up of his home life, to the near collapse of his sanity, we witness the gradual unsticking of John's mind, and the trouble that creates for him and his family.

Let the great world spin by Colum McCann

Winner of the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for 2011. Shortlisted for both the Bord Gais Energy Irish Book Awards Hughes & Hughes Irish Novel of the Year Award for 2010 and for the Bord Gais Irish Book Awards Book of the Decade.

New York, August 1974. A man is walking the sky. The city stands still in awe. Between the newly built Twin Towers the man is striding, twirling and showboating his way through the air. One hundred and ten stories below him, the lives of eight strangers spin towards each other. Corrigan, a radical, passionate Irish monk working in the Bronx with a clutch of prostitutes; Claire, a delicate Upper East Side housewife reeling from the death of her son in Vietnam; her husband Solomon, a cynical judge turning over petty criminals in a downtown court; Lara, a young artist struggling with a spiralling drug addiction and a doomed marriage; Fernando, a thirteen-year-old photographer chasing underground graffiti; Gloria, solid and proud despite decades of hardship; Tillie, a courageous hooker who used to dream of a better life; and Jazzlyn, her beautiful, reckless daughter raised on promises that reach beyond the high rises of New York. 

Set against a time of sweeping political and social change, from the backlash to the Vietnam War and the lingering sceptre of the oil crisis to the beginnings of the Internet - a time that hauntingly mirrors the present time - these disparate lives will collide in the shadow of one reckless and beautiful act, and be transformed for ever.

Weaving together themes of love, loss, belonging, duty and human striving, Let the Great World Spin celebrates the effervescent spirit of an age and the small beauties of everyday life. At once intimate and magnificent, elegant and astonishing, it is a lyrical masterpiece from a storyteller who continues to use the wide world as his canvas.

April Reads: Cavan Reading Group - We are revisiting some favourites this month!

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This Weeks Recommended Read...If you loved Pride and Prejudice..Read More!

Death Comes to Premberley by P.D. James

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The year is 1803, and Darcy and Elizabeth have been married for six years. There are now two handsome and healthy sons in the nursery, Elizabeth's beloved sister Jane and her husband Bingley live nearby and the orderly world of Pemberley seems unassailable. But all this is threatened when, on the eve of the annual autumn ball, the guests are preparing to retire for the night when a chaise appears, rocking down the path from Pemberley's wild woodland. As it pulls up, Lydia Wickham - Elizabeth's younger, unreliable sister - stumbles out screaming that her husband has been murdered. Inspired by a lifelong passion for the work of Jane Austen, PD James masterfully recreates the world of Pride and Prejudice, and combines it with the excitement and suspense of a brilliantly-crafted crime story. Death Comes to Pemberley is a distinguished work of fiction, from one of the best-loved, most- read writers of our time.

March Read: Cootehill Library Reading Group

The Hand that First Held Mine by Maggie O’Farrell

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Winner of the Costa Novel Award for 2010.

A gorgeously written story of love and motherhood, this is a tour de force from one of our best loved novelists. When the sophisticated Innes Kent turns up on her doorstep, Lexie Sinclair realises she cannot wait any longer for her life to begin, and leaves for London. There, at the heart of the 1950s Soho art scene, she carves out a new life. In the present day, Elina and Ted are reeling from the difficult birth of their first child. Elina struggles to reconcile the demands of motherhood with sense of herself as an artist, and Ted is disturbed by memories of his own childhood that don't tally with his parents' version of events. As Ted begins to search for answers, an extraordinary portrait of two women is revealed, separated by fifty years, but connected in ways that neither could ever have expected.

March Read - Cavan Library Reading Group

The pianist: by Wladyslay Szpilman

Thee extraordinary story of one man's survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945 / with extracts from the diary of Wilm Hosenfeld 

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Originally published in Poland in 1945 but suppressed, this memoir of survival in the Warsaw Ghetto joins the ranks of Holocaust memoirs notable as much for their literary value as for their historical significance. The author brings realism and clarity to the banalities of ghetto life, especially the eerie normalcy of some social relations amid catastrophic upheaval.

March Read: Bailiebrorough Reading Group

This month we are revisiting a Classic! 

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

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In the sparkling comedy of manners that follows, Jane Austen shows the folly of judging by first impressions and superbly evokes the friendships, gossip and snobberies of provincial middle-class life.

This weeks recommended read!

The Terrace by Maria Duffy

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Nestled in the tangled streets of Dublin city lies St Enda's Terrace, a small row of terraced houses. Everybody knows that the residents of St Enda's look out for each other and it isn't long before the little terrace comes to the attention of a New York production company making a fly-on-the-wall documentary about Ireland to be aired on St Patrick's Day. They want to film a real, old-fashioned Dublin community and St Enda's is the perfect location. But then, two days before the camera crews arrive, five of the residents of St Enda's win one million euro in the lotto. Trouble is that nobody can find the ticket ...Almost overnight, a once perfect community is brought to its knees. Secrets are discovered, lies exposed and a sequence of unfortunate events ensures that Enda's will never be the same again. Would you want to risk losing everything that's dear to you to become a millionaire? One thing is for sure - it seems that somebody in Enda's would!