Irish authors reading list

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10 must-read books by Irish authors

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Michael Magee

Exceptional . . . Every detail rings true, every character is fleshy and real and heartbreaking . . . Magee has a remarkable talent

Taut and impressive, unfaltering and deftly executed . . . [It] feels like that rarest of things: a genuinely necessary book

An exceptional debut destined for novel of the year shortlists

Michael Magee is a born storyteller. By the end of the novel I wanted to book a flight to Ireland just to walk around and imagine who was where . . . I read this in two or three sittings only because I wanted to slow down and spend more time with Magee's considered and companionate writing. I finished it only last month, but plan to take it with me abroad to enjoy it once more

Guardian ‘2023 Summer Reads’ (Derek Owusu)

A vision of a post-conflict Belfast that didn't deliver what it promised, blighted by poverty, pain and memory. But far from being bleak, I laughed out loud many times. And it is full of love. Each character is so vividly drawn that I felt like I had met them somewhere before; even the most flawed of them is treated with dignity and respect, and an absence of judgement that reminded me of Annie Ernaux. And the writing! Supple, rich and demotic - Kneecap meets Chekhov - no one else is doing this. I had great hopes for this novel and Michael Magee has booted it out of the park. Absolutely glorious.

Unflinching, direct, disarmingly sensitive . . . Suffusing his narrative with honesty and grace, Magee succeeds in bringing his neighborhood to life for readers and suggests that, amid what seems like a never-ending struggle, there is always room for hope

Michael Magee's Close to Home, amazingly a first novel, is about what it's like to be young and working class right now in Northern Ireland, and is a tremendous read, tensed and immersive, punching the air between hope and despair, deeply decent, unputdownable

Wonderful. A debut overflowing with years of experience and carefully worked craft. By turns hard-edged and soft-hearted, this novel is a gift from Michael Magee to us all

The message of Michael Magee's dead-on debut novel is universal. At its core, Close to Home is about finding a way to transcend the pain, the people and the place you're born into

A complex and compassionate portrait of modern Belfast by an impressive new talent . . . Close to Home is a working class novel, an Irish novel, a bildungsroman, a novel about the self-congratulatory failures of Northern Ireland's political elite . . . [and a] sharp deconstruction of toxic masculinity

Lucid and stirring . . . Magee's persistently evocative and beautifully matter-of-fact descriptions of Belfast's landmarks and people are intertwined with a sensitive awareness of the city's social, political and religious history

A convincing, nuanced debut, bleak but powerful, marrying the thematic unsentimentality of Edouard Louis with prose reminiscent of Irvine Welsh

A beautiful, rich, tough, kind portrait of a life in the balance. And a great study of masculinity, the brother, the friends, the long-lost dad. It's full of hope

Magee skilfully paints the landscape of a city still scarred by the Troubles . . . The book's themes - masculinity, class and history - don't offer easy resolutions. Instead, Magee deftly conveys the anxieties of a generation facing an uncertain future

A lyrical examination of masculinity, class, and poverty. Magee's prose sings with the tenderness of a writer beyond his years

Glorious. A bittersweet love letter to Northern Ireland... Magee confer[s] on even the ugliest of things (poverty, sectarianism, illness and death) a kind of sharp-edged elegance

Beautifully observed and sharp as a knife tip - as real and as raw as the truths you tell on a comedown, in the early hours, in the darkness of some stranger's house. Deeply affecting and badly needed, this is a novel I will be thinking about for a long time

Lisa McInerney, author of 'The Glorious Heresies'

A shard of authenticity, originality and brilliance

The Times (Summer Reads: 'Ask a bookseller')

Close to Home has an astonishing narrative energy. It is the story of a young man’s struggle to live in a society that is haunted by violence and maimed by the present as much as the past. But it is also a novel about love and friendship, created with great tenderness and tact. While some sections of the book offer an overwhelming sense of brutality, other sections are brilliant examples of comic writing. It is a novel that re-creates the city of Belfast in its own likeness, effortlessly handling idiom and tone and undertone. Close to Home offers us a new and memorable portrait of a young protagonist, caught between innocence and experience, as imagined by a supremely talented writer

Michael Magee's first novel is superb. An emotionally true, keenly observed book that goes deep into the troubled territory of home, family and friendship, returning with a message of love

David Hayden, author of 'Darker With The Lights On'

Close to Home does for Belfast what Shuggie Bain did for Glasgow. Its portrayal of a particular kind of masculinity - self-destructive and romantic by turns - is unsparing, funny and desperately sad. Keep an eye on Michael Magee; he's the real deal

Patrick Gale, author of 'A Place Called Winter'

How beautifully Magee has brought his characters to life, and how intricately he has created their world

Magee is his own man in his restrained approach . . . I took Sean to my heart and the last line of the book left me with a satisfying shiver

The best debut I've read in years - a tender examination of class, masculinity and place

Nicole Flattery, author of 'Show Them A Good Time'

Amazingly assured first novel. Magee is too good a writer... Gentle as well as brutal

As beautiful as it is brilliant. Reading Close to Home is like crossing a frontier into a new and thrilling territory

Glenn Patterson, author of 'The International'

Close To Home announces an exciting new voice - at once open and wary, tender and unyielding - and sharply alive to the pains and discoveries and mysteries of youth

Ringing out clear and true as a bell, it gleams with tenderness and perception. There are few narrators so unassuming and unaffected, yet so full of sharp intelligence

Precise, compulsive, companionable and genuinely moving. Michael Magee writes a world we see far too little of in contemporary literature. We need books like this

Seán Hewitt, author of 'All Down Darkness Wide'

A beautiful and devastating debut novel about political memory, violence, masculinity, and the impossibility of escaping your origins

A sharp and humane novel about a young man, and a city, caught in the painful throes of reimagining themselves. It rings with authenticity, and the wisdom of hard-won observation and experience - a hymn to the ways in which art can be a lifeline and an escape. Michael Magee's debut is an important addition to the burgeoning new canon of Belfast literature

Compulsively readable - you will need to know how this ends!

Sharp, immediate, beautiful writing. A vivid portrait of modern Belfast and of how our circumstances shape our lives. Every character is drawn with nuance and complexity, with great precision and attention to detail. I really loved this book

Artfully crafted, compassionate, precise and unafraid. I loved this book

Susannah Dickey, author of 'Common Decency'

Close to Home tracks brilliantly written characters across a vividly drawn Belfast

One of the year’s most distinctive and immersive debuts . . . Drawing on his own experiences, Michael Magee refreshes the post-Troubles novel to wrestle with his community’s painful heritage of violence and poverty. It sounds bleak, but Sean’s voice fizzes with life

It is so refreshing and exciting to read Close to Home . . . when you get to read a story like this it feels as though it is finally articulating so much that is unspoken in your subconscious, and addressing the fact that there’s a whole nation with collective PTSD

Michael Magee still manages to confer on even the ugliest of things (poverty, sectarianism, illness and death) a kind of sharp-edged elegance

The Times, '100 best summer reads for 2024'

In one of last year’s most distinctive debuts, Michael Magee wrestles with his home city of Belfast’s painful heritage of violence and poverty . . . Magee’s restrained approach is powerful and admirable

The Times, 'The best paperback novels 2024'

It's hard to find fault with a debut novel that unfold its storylines and characters with such care, handling themes of class, masculinity, addiction and trauma with both tenderness and a matter-of-factness

Michael Magees Close to Home is yet another brilliant novel to emerge from Northern Ireland, making sense of the impact of the long conflict and the transition to troubled peace; Magee powerfully delineates the psychology of those crushed by betrayal

Sean is back. Back in Belfast and back into old habits. Back on the mad all-nighters, the borrowed tenners and missing rent, the casual jobs that always fall through. Back in these scarred streets, where the promised prosperity of peacetime has never arrived. Back among his brothers, his ma, and all the things they never talk about. Until one night Sean finds himself at a party – dog-tired, surrounded by jeering strangers, his back against the wall – and he makes a big mistake.

Michael Magee

Praise for Close to Home

Exceptional . . . Every detail rings true, every character is fleshy and real and heartbreaking . . . Magee has a remarkable talent

Taut and impressive, unfaltering and deftly executed . . . [It] feels like that rarest of things: a genuinely necessary book

An exceptional debut destined for novel of the year shortlists

Exceptional . . . Every detail rings true, every character is fleshy and real and heartbreaking . . . Magee has a remarkable talent

Taut and impressive, unfaltering and deftly executed . . . [It] feels like that rarest of things: a genuinely necessary book

An exceptional debut destined for novel of the year shortlists

Exceptional . . . Every detail rings true, every character is fleshy and real and heartbreaking . . . Magee has a remarkable talent

Taut and impressive, unfaltering and deftly executed . . . [It] feels like that rarest of things: a genuinely necessary book

An exceptional debut destined for novel of the year shortlists

Articles featuring Michael Magee

10 must-read books by Irish authors

How do authors come up with character names?

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