Bøker av Julia O'Faolain

A book about being an outsider looking in, a trespasser in Ireland and in other countries - France, Italy in the late 1950s, the West Coast during the turbulent sixties - and also in other lives, the permanent temptation of the creative writer.

Her story was this: she had been an orphan, her mother probably a whore. That's true of what brought her here too: was she IRA, or did she just take risks for the sake of a friend?Julia O'Faolain paints a portrait of young Irish girls and their unseverable connection, showing solidarity in places politics cannot reach.

Julia O'Faolain is one of the most important Irish writers of the past half-century. Under the Rose is a selection of short stories taken from her many celebrated collections.These are stories about families and relationships, religion and politics, new life and mortality, and their settings range from Ireland and the USA to Italy and France. O'Faolain exposes the delusions of sexual desire, explores the failings of the Church and unpicks the casual brutalities of a patriarchal society. In an afterword, she considers the art of the short story and the influences that continue to shape her work.Powerful, profound and unflinching in their reflections on human experience, the stories in Under the Rose are masterpieces of the form.Praise for Julia O'Faolain:'The assurance, range and diversity of her stories . . . proclaim a writer of daunting gifts.' Guardian'Entertaining and rich in comedy . . . gripping and moving.' William Trevor'A wonderful stylist and an exciting writer . . . Her work is joyous, urbane and intensely Irish.' Independent on Sunday

1878: Pope Pius IX dies, after a misguided papacy that has stamped out liberalism, centralized papal power and witnessed the Pope's declaration of Infallibility. The Judas Cloth is told from the standpoint of Pius's son Nicola Santi, an orphan unaware of his scandalous paternity, who becomes a priest intent on honest and compassionate service, only to suffer disillusion.'A wonderful basilica of a novel.' Independent'An astonishing achievement.' Irish Times'Rich in bizarre theatre... unabashed period drama, gorgeous and sinister grand guignol.' Sunday Times'O'Faolain gently but unmistakably draws parallels with today's church... I hope his holiness reads it.' Telegraph

'I am hungry for your presence. I hanker for the great blaze of your glance which when you turn it on me, will burn out the husk of my body and draw my soul to you.'Julia O'Faolian's second novel, first published in 1973, offers a rich, vivid portrait of the political and religious turmoil of sixth-century Gaul, wherein we find Radegunda, wife of King Clotair having been seized by him as a prize of war. Radegunda builds a convent, a refuge for the Brides of Christ, and there becomes renowned for her austerity and mysticism. Her religion, however, is fanatical, and her quest for sainthood will serve to undermine the seeming calm of the retreat she has made.'Vibrant and strange... [a] journey into a darker, wilder moment of history.' Sarah Dunant, Guardian

'A writer of stunning quality, a novelist of irony and compassion who observes her American scene with a refreshingly European detachment.' Daily Telegraph'A novel of writhing ironies .

Julia O'Faolain's subtle, seductively plotted novel weaves together Ireland and Italy, romantic love and mystery...

'Entertaining and rich in comedy . . . gripping and moving.' William TrevorSister Judith Clancy is told that she must leave the protection of her convent and return to her family. So begins the unravelling of community ties which form this brilliant and devastating story of human and political relations in twentieth-century Ireland. Past and present, memory, madness and buried trauma shift in a disturbing kaleidoscope as four generations of the O'Malleys and Clanceys attempt to come to terms with the after-effects of the Irish Civil War.No Country for Young Men was nominated for the Booker Prize.'One of the very best books of its kind that it has ever been my pain and pleasure to read.' Guardian'A book to be bought and read and thought about.' Irish Times