Ireland
Ratings13
Average rating4.3
In the winter of 1951, a storyteller arrives at the home of nine-year-old Ronan O'Mara in the Irish countryside. The last practitioner of an honored, centuries-old tradition, the Seanchai enthralls his assembled audience for three evenings running with narratives of foolish kings and fabled saints, of enduring accomplishments and selfless acts -- until he is banished from the household for blasphemy and moves on. But these three incomparable nights have changed young Ronan forever, setting him on the course he will follow for years to come -- as he pursues the elusive, itinerant storyteller . . . and the magical tales that are no less than the glorious saga of his tenacious, troubled, and extraordinary isle.
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As I expected, I now desperately want to take a vacation to Ireland. While the structure of this book started to annoy me (one chapter of character development, one chapter of storytelling, repeat for 600 pages), I really enjoyed the content of it. I liked learning about the history and mythology of Ireland, and I enjoyed the characters and their stories. I'm pretty dense and didn't see the end coming, but I imagine most people would figure it out long before the end of the book. It seemed obvious once I finished it. I really liked this, which I didn't expect.
Wow, Frank Delaney is a master. This is really a special story that I feel honored to be able to read. I foresaw some things about the boys life but was happy to wait for it to come out in the story.
This story gave me a lot to chew on and I'm sure I'll come back to it many times to pick up crumbs that slipped through the many cracks of my memory. There is so much I want to remember, so much to learn about Ireland and about life if general.
This is one of the most wonderful specimens of historical fiction. What a fantastic way to tell the history of a people; of a place.
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