The once-great city of Bohane on the west coast of Ireland is on its knees, infested by vice and split along tribal lines. There are still some posh parts of town, but it is in the slums and backstreets of Smoketown, the tower blocks of the Northside Rises and the eerie bogs of Big Nothin' that the [...]

A kiss that just won't happen. A disco at the end of the world. A teenage goth on a terror mission. And OAP kiddie-snatchers, and scouse real-ale enthusiasts, and occult weirdness in the backwoods ..."Dark Lies the Island" is a collection of unpredictable stories about love and cruelty, crimes, desp[...]

* Shortlisted for the 2011 Costa Book Award in the First Novel category * "A blazingly original, wildly stylish, and pulpy debut novel""" ""City of Bohane," the extraordinary first novel by the Irish writer Kevin Barry, is full of marvels. They are all literary marvels, of course: marvels of languag[...]

Kevin Barry's deliciously wicked collection "Dark Lies the Island" delivers on the many reckless promises made by his virtuosic and prizewinning debut novel, "City of Bohane." It firmly establishes him as both a world-class word slinger and a masterful storyteller.[...]

A fresh (in more than one sense) and honest new voice in fiction is extravagantly displayed in this first novel that candidly dissects modern romance.

Plagued with weird parents, an underdeveloped body, and a mind on the verge of self-deconstruction, Phoebe Fine feels ill-equipped for a journ[...]