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Irish Stories
528 pages, Hardcover
Published March 3, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
April 3, 2026
I really enjoyed this book of 33 Irish short stories. Presented in chronological order beginning in 1833 they ranged from 1.25 pages to 64 pages in length, there some very very good, some pretty good, and a few stories that I didn’t get or like, all set in Ireland and written by an Irish person. Some were by authors you’ve read and most were not. But whatever, in a few pages you’re done and on to the next.
March 28, 2026
An absolute fantastic collection of short stories ranging from 1833 to 2024. Superb final line of the final story: “And even though it is too obvious to think, let alone to say, the thought rises: how there is only this living blindly forwards and remembering back, and that this dull fact is, in a nutshell, the tragedy of the thing. However it all turns out.”
March 19, 2026
I have developed the delightful habit of reading the Everyman’s Library short story anthology before, during, and after traveling. The publisher currently has 24 anthologies in print, topically and geographically oriented. They are pocket-editions, ideal for a daypack or carry-on.
Like any collection, they depend on permissions to reprint and no anthology should ever be considered definitive. This one is well-curated and serves a good sample of Irish literature, ranging from early folk tales to contemporary writing.
Of the 33 stories, here are my 12 favorites. I strongly encourage you to read all 33, but if you are overwhelmed and want to skip around, these 12 will serve you well:
“A Nineteenth Century Miracle” by Edith Somerville and Martin Ross.
Are you looking for an adventure story, regency satire, female empowerment, tensions with imperialism/colonialism, and folk tales all in one place? This is it. This story is fast, fun, entertaining, and reveals increasingly sophisticated layers the deeper you plunge.
“The Dead” by James Joyce.
T.S. Elliot described it as one of the greatest short stories ever written in English and Irish Literature can be separated into before and after “The Dead.” All the writing that follows, reference this novella implicitly or explicitly. I have read this story now three times in the past six months and each reading was individually revealing in its own way.
“Guests of the Nation” by Frank O’Connor
Put normal people in morally dubious situations buffeted by forces beyond their control, and dark things happen that affect lives and memory for years afterwards. This claustrophobic story uses dialogue within a small cast of characters to build a metaphor for the challenges of history. After you read this, you will feel like the narrator, “anything that ever happened me after I never felt the same about again.”
“The Last Night in the Old Home” by Elizabeth Bowen
This wealthy and (presumably) aristocratic family, has to auction their home and possessions due to poor life choices on the part of the heirs. Think Downton Abbey, the night before everything comes crashing down. This story asks how much we should feel for the victims of events outside of their control when the stakes are low from our perspective, but high for the participants.
“The Barrel of Rumours” by Maeve Brennan
A young girl in Dublin is our flawed narrator, telling us the story of a mysterious convent down the road whose residents live off unsolicited charitable donations. Our precocious protagonist, like us, is filled with questions, and the guarded answers from authority figures obfuscate more than clarify. The only thing we know for certain is that we don’t know anything for certain, even if we can see it in front of us.
“In a Cafe” by Mary Lavin
It is notoriously difficult to write a first-person interior monologue that delivers both conflict and a sense of what is at stake. Lavin takes us into the mind of a widowed woman meeting with another acquaintance, herself recently widowed. The two are searching for a way to ground themselves in their new reality. The protagonist struggles with her emotions and motivations, set within the self-imposed guardrails of perceived social dictates. Like most of us, she does not know what she wants until it slips out of reach.
“Bank Holiday” by John McGahern
What do we look for in a relationship with another person and what about our wants changes over time? Are we more or less demanding when we are young? What if the “shipboard romance” during the Bank Holiday turns out not to end, but to continue? Is that right? Maybe true love and compatibility are built from one Bank Holiday after another? If you have a t-shirt company and you’re looking for one-liners, McGahern’s strong voice gives more quotable quotes in this story than the others.
“The Empty Family” by Colm Toibin
What is home, can you go back to it, and if not can you create it by willing it into existence in the form and shape you are looking for? Is it a place or things or history or all of the above? And what if the people that you used to depend on to make it your home weren’t really as serious as you are?
“A Literary Lunch” by Eilis Ni Dhuibhne
This starts out as a dry satire of Dublin’s literary scene and then takes an abrupt turn that almost made me drop the book. This is probably the closest to a Stephen King short story that you can get in contemporary Irish literature. Enjoy it.
“How I Fell in Love with the Well-Documented Live of Alex Whelan” by Yan Ge
A brilliant and innovative story that examines multi-cultural modern Ireland, social media driven identity, the relationships we have with others, and the relationships we wish (or thought) we had. Our narrator wants to make connections and fall in love, but on her own terms. Yan asks if such a thing is even possible?
“Echolocations” by Lucy Sweeney Byrne
Byrne shows us a protagonist moving through place and time, seeing reflections of sense and memory, and using them to construct the boundaries and edges of her life. Like the eponymous sensory skill, she is able to construct a picture of her environment that allows her to navigate, but it is constantly changing. Is there such a thing as ‘now’ when the present is the sum of all the pasts?
“I am thirty-four, an age I never thought I’d be. But that only means I have accumulated thirty-four years of other ages, all of which brim and bubble within me, vying for attention.”
Like any collection, they depend on permissions to reprint and no anthology should ever be considered definitive. This one is well-curated and serves a good sample of Irish literature, ranging from early folk tales to contemporary writing.
Of the 33 stories, here are my 12 favorites. I strongly encourage you to read all 33, but if you are overwhelmed and want to skip around, these 12 will serve you well:
“A Nineteenth Century Miracle” by Edith Somerville and Martin Ross.
Are you looking for an adventure story, regency satire, female empowerment, tensions with imperialism/colonialism, and folk tales all in one place? This is it. This story is fast, fun, entertaining, and reveals increasingly sophisticated layers the deeper you plunge.
“The Dead” by James Joyce.
T.S. Elliot described it as one of the greatest short stories ever written in English and Irish Literature can be separated into before and after “The Dead.” All the writing that follows, reference this novella implicitly or explicitly. I have read this story now three times in the past six months and each reading was individually revealing in its own way.
“Guests of the Nation” by Frank O’Connor
Put normal people in morally dubious situations buffeted by forces beyond their control, and dark things happen that affect lives and memory for years afterwards. This claustrophobic story uses dialogue within a small cast of characters to build a metaphor for the challenges of history. After you read this, you will feel like the narrator, “anything that ever happened me after I never felt the same about again.”
“The Last Night in the Old Home” by Elizabeth Bowen
This wealthy and (presumably) aristocratic family, has to auction their home and possessions due to poor life choices on the part of the heirs. Think Downton Abbey, the night before everything comes crashing down. This story asks how much we should feel for the victims of events outside of their control when the stakes are low from our perspective, but high for the participants.
“The Barrel of Rumours” by Maeve Brennan
A young girl in Dublin is our flawed narrator, telling us the story of a mysterious convent down the road whose residents live off unsolicited charitable donations. Our precocious protagonist, like us, is filled with questions, and the guarded answers from authority figures obfuscate more than clarify. The only thing we know for certain is that we don’t know anything for certain, even if we can see it in front of us.
“In a Cafe” by Mary Lavin
It is notoriously difficult to write a first-person interior monologue that delivers both conflict and a sense of what is at stake. Lavin takes us into the mind of a widowed woman meeting with another acquaintance, herself recently widowed. The two are searching for a way to ground themselves in their new reality. The protagonist struggles with her emotions and motivations, set within the self-imposed guardrails of perceived social dictates. Like most of us, she does not know what she wants until it slips out of reach.
“Bank Holiday” by John McGahern
What do we look for in a relationship with another person and what about our wants changes over time? Are we more or less demanding when we are young? What if the “shipboard romance” during the Bank Holiday turns out not to end, but to continue? Is that right? Maybe true love and compatibility are built from one Bank Holiday after another? If you have a t-shirt company and you’re looking for one-liners, McGahern’s strong voice gives more quotable quotes in this story than the others.
“The Empty Family” by Colm Toibin
What is home, can you go back to it, and if not can you create it by willing it into existence in the form and shape you are looking for? Is it a place or things or history or all of the above? And what if the people that you used to depend on to make it your home weren’t really as serious as you are?
“A Literary Lunch” by Eilis Ni Dhuibhne
This starts out as a dry satire of Dublin’s literary scene and then takes an abrupt turn that almost made me drop the book. This is probably the closest to a Stephen King short story that you can get in contemporary Irish literature. Enjoy it.
“How I Fell in Love with the Well-Documented Live of Alex Whelan” by Yan Ge
A brilliant and innovative story that examines multi-cultural modern Ireland, social media driven identity, the relationships we have with others, and the relationships we wish (or thought) we had. Our narrator wants to make connections and fall in love, but on her own terms. Yan asks if such a thing is even possible?
“Echolocations” by Lucy Sweeney Byrne
Byrne shows us a protagonist moving through place and time, seeing reflections of sense and memory, and using them to construct the boundaries and edges of her life. Like the eponymous sensory skill, she is able to construct a picture of her environment that allows her to navigate, but it is constantly changing. Is there such a thing as ‘now’ when the present is the sum of all the pasts?
“I am thirty-four, an age I never thought I’d be. But that only means I have accumulated thirty-four years of other ages, all of which brim and bubble within me, vying for attention.”
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews