Rust

Rust #1

by Donal Ryan, Signe Lyng (Translator)

Det økonomiske kollaps og finanskrisen forårsager farlige spændinger mellem indbyggerne i en lille by. Grådighed graver grøfter mellem tidligere venner. Arbejdsløshed, sorte penge, et mord og en barne­bortførelse sender chokbølger gennem det lille samfund.

Genres: Fiction, Ireland, Irish Literature, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, Book Club, Novels

171 pages, Paperback

First published October 11, 2012

About the author

Donal Ryan is the author of the novels The Spinning Heart, The Thing About December, the short-story collection A Slanting of the Sun, and the forthcoming novel All We Shall Know. He holds a degree in Law from the University of Limerick, and worked for the National Employment Rights Authority before the success of his first two novels allowed him to pursue writing as a full-time career.

Reviews

[karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

this book won "book of the year" at the irish book awards in 2012. if james joyce had published every single book he had ever written in 2012, this book still would have won. hi, i'm karen - i make bold declarative statements. welcome.

this book is a stunner. like Broken Harbour, it speaks to the devastating economic and social climate in ireland after the death of the celtic tiger. in this particular, unnamed, small town, when the local construction company goes out of business and its owner skips town without paying his workers their wages, it is just one factor contributing to a series of events that will ultimately end in kidnapping and murder.

this book captures small-town life perfectly. it is told in a chorus of voices, where each chapter is narrated (in dialect ♥) by a single character, and through their individual voices, we see a whole tapestry of resentments, ambitions, yearning, grief, admiration - the shared, embarrassed past and the shining, small-scale heroes. it is so deftly handled in such a short book - it is nothing short of astonishing.

it is funny, it is sad, it is dark, it is a scattershot of singular, lonely existences that make up this heartbreaking jewel of a novel. but there is a story here - it is not just a collection of experiences, it just happens to be narrated by a number of different people and perspectives, some unreliable, for sure, but the interlocking bits do make up a cohesive story. it is gripping, it is wonderful, and i cannot wait to read more from him.

come to my blog!

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

I see William Trevor as Donal Ryan’s great forerunner.
The Spinning Heart of the novel is a weathervane on the gate…
Voices of many village dwellers… Tales of love and hate… Life is sad… Life is ruinous…

My father still lives back the road past the weir in the cottage I was reared in. I go there every day to see is he dead and every day he lets me down. He hasn’t yet missed a day of letting me down. He smiles at me; that terrible smile. He knows I’m coming to check is he dead. He knows I know he knows. He laughs his crooked laugh.

Characters tell their life stories… Sons… Fathers… Mothers… A former floozy…

There’s plenty calls me a witch. It doesn’t bother me. I haven’t aged well; I look a lot older than I am. I have rheumatoid arthritis. It pains me everywhere. It has me curled over, balled up, all smallness and sharp edges. I’m like a cut cat half the time. Men never call here any more. My children never call to me, even.

A clueless emigrant… A single mother… A retarded fellow… A loser… Many others… And the man hating his father is a recurring figure in their stories… Anxiety… Troubles… Mental problems… The inner world is disintegrating…

That whole thing about him doing the dirt on Triona with Seanie’s wan was all bullshit, but that was the start of all the madness. I reckon it was that crazy-looking auld bint that lives in the only other house in that estate that’s lived in that started all that auld talk.

We live and our hearts keep on spinning.

[Peter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Predicament
The Spinning Heart is an outstanding book that vividly portrays the damage the financial crisis had on people’s lives in Ireland while elevating our reading experience to such wonderful heights with beautiful poetic writing.

“There’s a red metal heart in the centre of the low front gate, skewered on a rotating hinge. It’s flaking now; the red is nearly gone. It needs to be scraped and sanded and painted and oiled. It still spins in the wind, though. I can hear it creak, creak, creak as I walk away. A flaking, creaking, spinning heart.”

Often in moments of hardship you find humour, and Donal Ryan weaves the light and dark of a community dealing with a local murder and the hardships of life during the economic crash in Ireland in 2008.

The collapse of the economy and in particular the construction industry was catastrophic. Building companies went bust, leaving builders, suppliers and tradesmen massively in debt as each had extended their credit with banks for greater and greater rewards. Ghost estates of houses in various states of completeness littered the country. Exactly the scene that anchor’s Donal’s book.

The structure of the book is told chapter by chapter in the first person from an array of 21 notable and flawed characters, collectively showing the diversity that exists in a rural Irish community. The image and persona of each character is magically brought to life with wonderful impact. The central character and soul of the novel, is Bobby Mahon, a foreman on a building site owned by Pokey Burke. Following the collapse, Pokey absconded leaving huge debts and his now unemployed former workers are left dazed by the fact that he hadn’t been paying corporation tax or the income tax and insurance contributions for his employees.

There is an uneasy despairing acceptance from many of the characters and a harsh ruminating atmosphere is maintained as we journey through the narrative. Many of the voices carry the connection with Bobby through their own tales; some knowing and admiring him, some recognising his presence from a distance. The wonderful touches of personality that each character paints of the community draws us an amazing picture of life and its hardships, the complexion of the people and how they always find a way to keep going no matter how broken their lives become. What I found very emotional and heartbreaking were the moments in the narrative where we come to appreciate how damaging a person can be to a wife, husband, son, daughter, friend or neighbour without specifically meaning it, but due to being selfish or stubborn or uncompromising, how they can affect the lives of others, especially those closest to them. Bobby blames his father for the darkest most destructive aspects of his life.

“My father still lives back down the road past the weir in the cottage I was reared in. I go there every day to see is he dead and every day he lets me down. He hasn’t missed a day of letting me down.”

This is an exceptional book, devastating, compelling and resonates with many communities. Donal Ryan writes with great humanity and honesty, as his rotation through his characters brings life to a village managing goodness, badness and murder. The complexity of perspectives and whispering dialogue is astounding. I highly recommend this book and I'm not surprised it was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2013 as his debut book.

Additional Book Ratings
Cover Design: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Title: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Proofreading Success: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Quality of Book Formatting: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Book Format/Status: Hardback/Released
Illustrations: N/A
Number of Pages: 156
Number of Chapters: 21 (approx 7 pages per chapter)

[Fionnuala]

The Tragic Demise of the Spinning Heart

Who killed the heart?
I, said the land owner,
With greed for more kroner
I killed the heart.

Who watched it die?
I, said the developer,
With large loans of guilder
I watched it die.

Who caught its blood
I, said the builder,
With poor bricks and timber,
I caught its blood.

Who’ll make the shroud?
I, said the sub-contractor,
With unpaid bills to factor,
I’ll make the shroud.

Who'll dig the grave?
I, said the banker,
With broad smiles and thankya'
I'll dig the grave.

Who'll be the clerk?
I, said the regulator
with my faulty calculator,
I'll be the clerk.

Who'll be the parson?
I, said the deputy,
With my land and property,
I'll be the parson.

Who'll be chief mourner?
We, said the people
Who elected the deputies,
We’ll be chief mourners.

All the towns in the land
Felt a great stinging smart,
when they heard of the death
Of the poor spinning heart.


That's my version of the moral at the heart of this book: Donal Ryan's tale offers a nicely paced allegorical explanation for the demise of the Celtic Tiger, that decade of borrowing and building that left Ireland with a rash of half completed apartment blocks, a pox of unpaid debts and a severe bout of unemployment.

The story is spun out in a small rural town where the local building contractor has absconded leaving an uncompleted housing development and many debts to workers, suppliers and would-be home owners. Things can only get worse.

Ryan tells the story from multiple points of view; the group of townspeople most directly concerned with the events each take their turn to give their version. The author has succeeded in giving them all distinctly different voices but the piece that worked best from a writing point of view was the opening section in the voice of Bobby Mahon, the section from which the powerful spinning heart image comes. I'll be curious to read other writing by this gifted author.

I apologise for the feeble quality of the rhyme - it's not my strong point but the Who killed Cock Robin question/answer pattern fits the structure of this story perfectly. As in the rhyme, everyone in The Spinning Heart has a role to play in the events of the story and there is a lot of sighing and sobbing by the end.

[Maciek · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Spinning Heart is the debut of Irish novelist Donal Ryan, and a good one. Although the book was rejected dozens of times by various publishing houses, when it finally appeared in print it found not only an audience, but also appreciation - it won the Guardian First Book Award and was longlisted for the Booker prize. I can see the appeal - The Spinning Heart is a touching, beautiful book, but one that ultimately falls victim to its own structure and theme.

The Spinning Heart is set in a small town in rural Ireland, hit hard by the recession after the collapse of the Celtic Tiger. Local residents have been particularly affected, after the construction company - the town's main employer - closes down, and the owner moves away without giving his workers their pay. Unemployment is rampant, leading to growing violence and alcoholism, along with all sorts of tensions rising in depressed families. The eponymous spinning heart is a symbolic metal heart, set in the gate of a local house - a symbolic heart, ever spinning in the wind, but never going anywhere.

The novel is formed of 21 short chapters, each narrated by a different character, most of whom know and often speak of one another - after all most of them spend their lives in the same small town. Donal Ryan's writing is lyrical and poetic, allowing us to not only glimpse the character's lives and feelings in just a few pages, but to grow to care for them. There are many beautiful excerpts to choose from - Bobby Mahon, a man who grew with a cruel father and was powerless to stop him from abusing his mother, whom he loved; Vasya, an immigrant from the far east of Siberia, who speaks little English and yet connects with his new country and its people. My personal favorite has to be Lily - an old woman, remembering her past relationships with various men of the town, and mourning loss of connection with her different children, especially John - her last, youngest son. John didn't admit his mother to his graduation, even though she scraped and saved to send him to the university; his eyes are already aimed at other women, other cities. I love my children like a swallow loves a blue sky; I have no choice in the matter. I cry over them in the dark of night. I often wake up calling their names. Lily's loneliness is deep, palpable and touching.

Yet for all its merit The Spinning Heart suffers from a fundamental flaw - too much of a good thing. After reading chapter after chapter of characters beaten by life, we lose sight of who's who; we start to mix up their names and events from their lives. Wht began as beautifully drawn and presented vignettes starts being tiring, and the effect is that of overbearing. There are characters in this novel who could have had whole books dedicated just to them - they made that strong impression on me in just a few pages; but this impression became lost as I read on, and witnessed another tragedy, another failure. I can;t blame Donal Ryan for being ambitious and compassionate toward his subjects - I wish he focused his talent on fewer strong points, instead of spreading it too thing. This is not to say that The Spinning Heart is not worth reading - it certainly is, and might be the first work of a new talent. But the structure that Donal Ryan chose for this work only allows for so much - hopefully he will write more novels, and will give his ability and skill enough space to truly flourish.

[Nat K · Rating 4 out of 5]

"It's a strange dichotomy, so it is; feeling and knowing; the feeling feels truer that the knowing of its falseness."

It's hard to read a book by an Irish writer and not be reading it with an Irish accent in your head. Or maybe just that's just me.

This book blew me away. The deftness with which the stories are pulled together the further you delve into the book is astonishing. Is this a novella? At a pinch I'd say it squeezes into that mold.

Each chapter of this book is told from the perspective of twenty-one people. From women, to men, children, the elderly and even the ghost of a recently departed, tell their story. Each adding their piece of the jigsaw puzzle of life in a small county in Ireland. Through their thoughts and ramblings, we're painted a picture of the trying times they're living through.

The impression I have from this story is one of tiredness. A tired country with tired people trying to make ends meet. They're generally dissatisfied with their lot. And who can blame them? The economy is a mess. Jobs are hard to come by. Many are left high & dry by bosses doing the midnight flit to sunnier climes, leaving them with months of unpaid wages. While others are being ripped off to do more work for less money, the logic being they should be "grateful" to have any job at all. It's no wonder there's so much angst going on. And bitterness, that will be paid for dearly.

"I'm owed a small fortune. The sky is falling down."

There are themes of mental health and violence, as the characters struggle to make sense of their lives, and life in general.

"I never told anyone about the blackness I feel sometimes, weighing me down and making me think things I don't want to think."

Despite all this, as is the way of the world, there is also lust, longing and love. From fledgling relationships, to relationships gone wrong, to comfortable love, we're right there with them, inside the characters' heads.

"There's something unspeakable about the attraction between a man and a woman. It can't ever be explained."

I loved how the more chapters you read, that you got a fuller perspective of events that each of the characters is describing. A 360 degree perspective. It's beautifully done.

I felt quite sad reading this book. So many of the characters made such insightful observations about both themselves and the world around them, it made me catch my breath. And my heart ache. But there are also humorous moments (dark as they are). Blink, and you'll miss them.

I found it difficult to write a coherent review, as there is just so much going on in it. So many tangents, so many stories.

This is a solid 4.5★s for me. I've found another favourite writer in Donal Ryan. I'm looking forward to catching up with more of his books.

*** Buddy read with the wonderful, talented Mr.Neale-ski. Make sure you check out his review, it's far more coherent than mine.
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... ***

I love that the story ended with Bobby & Triona. It gave me hope 💗

"Tears spilled down his face. I just said oh love; oh love, what matters now? What matters only love?"

[Metodi Markov · Rating 4 out of 5]

Хареса ми как е разкрил микрокосмоса на ирландското село мистър Райън! Минало, бъдеще и настояще са усукани в тънко, но много здраво въже, което не би трябвало да може да се прокъса леко.

Интересен подход е избрал той за дебютния си роман - всяка глава е предадена през погледа на различен участник в събитията.

Ирландия е ударена много тежко от световната икономическа криза през 2008-2009 година. Мнозина губят всичко, отчаяние и бедност чукат на врати, които са ги забравили за десетилетия. Парадоксално, но част от старото поколение са доволни от случилото се - така имат повод да се оплакват отново едни на други, както някога.

А на края остава само любов, нали?

С удоволствие ще прочета и други книги от този автор.

Цитат:

"Кой е крив, ако едно дете се окаже гнила ябълка?"

[Angela M · Rating 4 out of 5]

I recently read a beautiful review of Heart, Be at Peace by my Goodreads friend and wonderful author Julie Christine Johnson . I knew I wanted to read it as I have loved four of Donal Ryan’s other novels. It’s a sequel to The Spinning Heart which has been on my list and my kindle for quite some time. I’m so glad I finally got to it . Thanks to Julie for the nudge.

A collapsed economy in 2008 leaves the people in this rural Irish town traumatized and broken. It’s complicated since they are already burdened by dysfunctional family life, by the affect of alcoholism , by sickness and death - the realities of life . In twenty one first person narratives of men, women, a child, a dead man , one per chapter, we learn of their trials of the moment as well as their pasts . Their stories are dark at times and the stories connect by overlapping characters, by unemployment, by a sadness and sometimes fear that permeates with emphasis on complicated relationships- parents and children, husbands and wives , friends. Everyone seems to know everyone, but do they really?

The stories are heartbreaking and dark. I found the story telling mechanism to be interesting and effective in reflecting the town and its troubles in a realistic way . This was Ryan’s debut novel . I’ve read several others by him where I found the prose perhaps more lyrical than in this one. This one is nonetheless a thought provoking and moving read. I’ll have to get to Heart, Be at Peace soon so I can see how this town and these characters fared with the passing of years.

[Kinga · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn’t think I would enjoy this novel, or rather novella. I’m wary of those 160 page books; they often seem so lazy in execution, like something the writer just phoned in. You know, you start and immediately you get, ekhm, the sense of an ending.

Additionally, the cover of ‘The Spinning Heart’ looked dangerously close to Alan Hollinghurst ‘The Line of Beauty’, so I expected the book to be half-assed and derivative, as well as full of bleakness steeped in alcohol (it being an Irish book).

As you can see, I started reading this choice of my book club with my head full of misconceptions. I was so adamant in my prejudice that it wasn’t until somewhere halfway through when I finally admitted to myself that ‘The Spinning Heart’ was. in fact, quite wonderful, although there is a lot of bleakness steeped in alcohol, as it would be unavoidable in a book which takes place in rural Ireland in the wake of the financial crash. I honestly don’t know what Irish writers did during their country sudden and short-lived but amazing prosperity. No one wants to hear about that.

Every tiny chapter of 'The Spinning Heart' is narrated by a different character who takes the stage to tell their story. All of them have their unique voices and personalities so Ryan’s narrative and characterization skills can't be faulted. The plot is interwoven with the stories so seamlessly that the characters never seem like props to push the plot along. They are definitely there to get something of their chests and are completely unaware of the little bits they drop in that let us know where the story is going.

The book opens with Bobby’s chapter and we immediately paint him in our heads the way he sees himself – a rather average, morally flawed ‘culchie’. It’s only when we hear about him from other characters he grows in our eyes and eventually becomes a village hero. I absolutely loved putting different glasses on with every chapter and looking at the same community from a different vantage point. As usual, I did feel most for the obvious nutters (coincidentally – Telegraph’s reviewer identified three nutters. I only remember two. I missed a nutter?)

‘The Spinning Heart’ might be often bleak but it is also funny, tender and many other things and made me wonder how it was exactly possible for it to be so full and rich while being so short. It reads like a much longer book. And it’s cracking! I also think it could be beautifully adapted for stage.

[Samadrita · Rating 3 out of 5]

Don't get me wrong. It's not like I do not see why this slim novella has garnered such high praise from all corners. This is just another case of it's-not-the-book-it's-me. The rhetoric on depression, grief and some crushing personal tragedy that is harped on again and again grates on the nerves after a while. The meticulous use of the multiple person narrative to bring to life all the aspects of one character through the eyes of every one else, gets overshadowed by the trite nature of the themes emphasized. And the fervent admirer of good prose and good metaphors that I am, all the crude imagery thrust on the reader page after page fuelled my annoyance to a great degree.
3 stars because this is a writer of merit who uses regionalisms to create a lifelike portrait of an Ireland under the cloud of recession and does so quite effectively. I'll look out for Ryan's future works.

[Paul Bryant · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just like a great song uses the exact same five or six chords every other ordinary song has previously used and creates magic, this guy Donal Ryan does nothing at all we haven’t seen or read a hundred times before, the same kind of human disasters, and yet he creates magic. In a small Irish town a whole lot of people are leading variously unhappy lives and tiny chapter by tiny chapter they tell you direct-to-camera about what’s on their mind. That’s all there is to it. There ain’t much plot. There are a couple of incidents. I did count 62 characters in these 156 pages but it’s okay, you only have to remember 16 really.

All the characters of course speak in their beautiful wry Irish vernacular –

He’d have gotten some hop if I’d left him off out thinking he was the boy his mother told him he was.

He’s the pure solid cut head off of his father.

I don’t like the sound of getting made little of from pillar to post.

She smoked fags into my face and got the world of ash on my lovely clean carpet.

There are rakes of men around here that have called to me, I’ve had years of eyes at my door.

There was something wrong with his heart, it wouldn’t stay beating.

This last was about a premature baby, the saddest line in the whole book.

To summarise:

Totally recommended.

[Sue · Rating 5 out of 5]

In The Spinning Heart, a small Irish town is suffering under the weight of the late 2000s economic bust that saw industry leave the country and the building boom come to a screeching halt. Unemployment is rampant. Alcohol use, always an issue in Ireland and Irish literature, is also rising. Ryan has chosen to present his portrait of the town and time through snapshots of town residents, spoken in their voices.

Chief among them is Bobby Mahon, product of a rough home, but largely appreciated in the town. He grew up with a cruel father and a mother he loved who was powerless to stop the man. On visiting a friend's house for dinner he sees:


"Their father was wiry and kind-looking. He had a lovely
smile. He'd warm you with it. You knew there was nothing
in him only good nature....It twisted my soul, the pleasure
of that house, the warmth of it and the laughter; it was
nearly unbearable to be there and to have half my mind
filled with the chill and the gloom and the thick silence
of our cottage." (loc 98)


The writing throughout is excellent, often rough, occasionally lyrical. The most lyrical passage for me was an immigrant's view of the land, an unemployed worker from Siberia.


"There is no flatness in this land. It is all small hills
and hidden valleys. Birds sing that I cannot see; they hide
in trees and fly in covered skies. The horizon is close
and small. There is daily rain that makes the earth green.
A short journey in any direction ends at the sea." (loc 308)


Each person reveals another layer of the town's life as well as their own.

Definitely recommended


An advance copy of this book was provided by the publisher through NetGalley for the purpose of an unbiased review.

[PattyMacDotComma · Rating 5 out of 5]

5★
“He drank out Granddad’s farm years ago. After I have him buried, I’ll burn the cottage down and p*ss on the embers and I’ll sell the two acres.”

Bobby Mahon has been visiting his sick father every day, hoping each day will be the last. As he leaves through the old front gate, he reflects on it needing attention.

“There’s a red metal heart in the centre of the low front gate, skewered on a rotating hinge. It’s flaking now; the red is nearly gone. It needs to be scraped and sanded and painted and oiled. It still spins in the wind, though. I can hear it creak, creak, creak as I walk away. A flaking, creaking, spinning heart.”

If only it were his father’s heart on the skewer, to pay for the misery he inflicted on Bobby and his mother. Like so many people, especially these Irish men, they never really know how to talk. Bobby does know his father takes great joy in Bobby losing his job.

“It gave him an extra six months, I’d say. If he ever finds out how Pokey Burke shafted me, he’ll surely make a full recovery. Pokey could apply to be beatified then, having had a miracle ascribed to him.”

Pokey Burke will not be made a saint. Josie Burke, his father, had been a good boss, but when Pokey let the men go, Bobby says there were rumblings. They’d had several years of building cheap houses, borrowing and building, but they went bust.

“ I should have known something was up the day last year when Mickey Briars came in asking about his pension. Did ye boys know we’re all meant to be in a proper pension? We didn't, Mickey. Ya, with some crowd called ‘SIFF’. A proper pension like, not just the state one. Tis’ extra.’ Mickey’s left hand was outstretched. It held the invisible weight of what he should have been given but wasn’t.
. . .
Mickey’s hard old skull splintered that door and it very nearly gave way. Pokey must have sh*t himself inside. I want my f*ckin pension, you little pr*ck, Mickey roared and roared. I want my f*ckin pension and the rest of my stamps.
. . .
We locked Mickey into the back of Seanie Shaper’s Hiace until he became more philosophical for himself.”

This is a town where everyone knows everyone’s secrets, or so they believe. They have theories as to why someone’s business failed and how they could have prevented it, but as the author lets each of the 21 characters speak, we gradually get a more rounded view of things.

When two people are seen talking together, rumours begin. The garda are in the street, a stranger is seen outside the shops, a blow-in moves to town (for what reason?) – any of these require a discussion as to what is happening or about to happen. Bobby’s wife, Triona, refers to one group of women as the Teapot Taliban.

The language changes with the people. The words are strung together so smoothly that I wasn’t even aware of the lack of quotation marks and such, although I know that’s a deal-breaker for some readers.

It’s not for skimming, it’s for listening to the words in your head, the lilt, the Irish inflection, the subtle differences between the outgoing and the quiet, the sly and the simple. Each chapter is headed with the name of its narrator, and many of the names feature in each other’s memories. We see some people, like Bobby and Pokey, in increasingly greater detail.

Vasya, “the Russian”, discovers he doesn’t exist. He had come from his home in Siberia, following advice from friends. He was a good worker but had no English. He’s put on as a C2 worker.

“ I took from others words and phrases that served me well for a while: off the books, under the table, on the queue tee. One man can learn some trades by watching another closely. Now I work some days for the foreman again. Bobby. He calls me the best of the ‘see too’ boys. I don’t know what this means. I smile and nod.”

He learns what ‘see too’ (C2) means when he tries to claim his entitlements when the business closes.

“sub-contractors, foreign workers who were only taken on by builders if they registered as self-employed. That way the builder hadn’t to pay the proper rates; stamps, tax, pensions or what have you.”

Lily the Bike, as another woman refers to her disparagingly, is a favourite of mine.

“There are rakes of men around here that have called to me. I’ve had years of eyes at my door. Eyes that can’t meet mine, full of hunger when they arrive and full of guilt as they leave.
. . .
I’d never blame a man for calling to me. Men have to do what they have to do. Nature overpowers them. Some of the old farmers were lovely, once you got over the smell. They had a smell you could nearly talk yourself into liking. I even bathed one or two of them — they loved it - like big auld babas, splashing around and grinning up at me...”

I don’t know if it’s coincidence or not, but lately I’ve read a few books by Irish authors who haven’t used quotation marks, and some have used almost no punctuation at all. I often write in fractured phrases rather than full sentences if that’s how I’m thinking, so maybe it makes me more comfortable with this run-on style.

This was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2013. The many chapters from different viewpoints reminded me of Irish author Jon McGregor’s Reservoir 13 and If Nobody Speaks Of Remarkable Things, both of which are favourites and were also longlisted for the Booker Prize in earlier years.

I love this one.

[Neale · Rating 4 out of 5]

The best word to describe the relationship between Bobby and his father is toxic. Everyday Bobby travels back to the little cottage in which he grew up to check if his father is still alive, and everyday Bobby is disappointed to find that he is. There is a red metal heart in the centre of the gate to the cottage, rusted, paint flaking off, a metaphor for his father’s equally broken down heart. We find later in the book that his father had an eerily similar relationship with his own father.

Ireland is still reeling from financial collapse and recession when Pokey Burke, Bobby’s boss, disappears owing Bobby and many others money and wages. Bobby was the foreman of a building crew, looked up to by the lads, but secretly lacking confidence and seeing himself as a coward, a failure, searching for reasons as to why his wife sticks by his side.

Bobby is the dominant, central character in, for such a short novel, a massive cast of twenty-one. These character’s personal narratives are woven together to form the story that is The Spinning Heart. With all these characters, we can see the debilitating effects that a national crisis has on a small rural town. How the recession seems to amplify and exacerbate smaller personal problems.
At times the town almost feels like a puzzle and each character an integral piece needed to piece together the overall story. Each piece or character will often have links to other characters and the reader may learn more about a character from another character’s perspective. This brings to the fore, a major theme of this novel. Misconception and how, with lack of information, or the prevalence of rumours, how easy it is to judge somebody erroneously. We bear witness to how these erroneous views can have drastic, fatal consequences, at the end of the book.

As we approach the end of the book, the narratives tend to get darker, with a child abduction and a murder rocking the little town. Again, rumours and innuendo cloud the character’s perspectives as the culprits are sought after.

Ryan returns to Bobby’s narrative at the end of the book and does a wonderful job of filling in the blanks and again showing us that time after time things are not what they seem, and how we confidently believe something to be how we perceive it may not be the correct perception at all.
Wonderful debut. 4 stars.

This was another buddy read with the wonderful Nat K and please stop and check out her review when she posts it.

[Rae Meadows · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was very impressed with this book as a project--a story of an Irish town after the financial collapse told through 21 different voices, one per chapter, none of them repeated. There's plenty of violence and sadness, but also some moments of goodness, and overall I really liked how the lens keeps shifting around the town for different perspectives on the same events.

I struggled some with the dialect, and some of the voices/characters are much stronger than others. The Rory chapter I found particularly poignant. A few I felt fell into cliche. (And the kidnap story line just seemed random) Although it wouldn't be as sexy of a conceit, I would have preferred hearing from some of the characters, particularly Bobby who is the novel's focus, more than once. The Spinning Heart is a very quick and compelling read though I'm not sure I connected with it as much as I might have given a different narrative device.

[Jodi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Increased rating to 4.5 stars—26 Apr 2024. I cannot stop thinking about this incredible book!! What a fantastic story!!!

A very good story told in a highly creative manner, with one chapter dedicated to each of the 21 characters. With each character’s perspective, we learn a little bit more about the story. Each one releases a clue that, when all are considered together, will inform the whole. All the characters are wounded—either by the economic downturn or by some internal conflict they’re experiencing. I’ve never read a book that was formulated in this way, but it can be highly effective, if done well. And this was definitely done well!! The characters are “real” people—flaws and all—and, as you might expect, the book includes plenty of rumour and innuendo, but if readers are paying attention, they’ll find all the clues necessary to understand the story. Very well done!

This was my third Donal Ryan novel completed since mid-February. I am hooked!

4.5 “What-an-adventure!” stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

[Kelly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This review originally appeared on my blog, Shoulda Coulda Woulda Books.

The way we consume national cultures has always been fascinating to me. National identity as a pre-packaged product and lifestyle, national identity and history as a foundational rationale for political moves, this idea of a constructed identity somehow being “natural” or something that lives in our very alike bloodcells. (Man, did anyone else read that BBC study where some scientists triumphantly pointed out that the gene pool of the British Isles countries that had fought each other forever over their differences were, essentially, 99.9% exactly the same? I sent a lot of conveniently ignored emails on the day that thing came out.)

Modern Irishness is definitely one of the most consumer-produced, artificial things that I’ve seen depicted in popular culture. I mean, St. Patrick’s Day is obviously the grossest and most extreme representation of the lot, but the other signs are familiar too. Green things, sad violin and tin whistle music, flannels and fishermen’s sweaters, dark farmers and darker pubs, lilting voices and people who don’t move their hands when they dance. And, having grown up amongst festivals of Irish nostalgia, I can promise you that I’ve spent many hours seeing just how genuine it feels to many people.

And of course there’s a kernel of truth. Many of these things were real before they became a performative identity- or at least real enough that it counts. But it's hard not to feel like so much of the identity is a put-on, a self-perpetuating fantasy that makes tons of money off of echoes of memories of great-grandmothers and a longing for community, and a past.

But this book deals with something that is undeniably real and true to the verifiable facts of the country, something that gives all the rest of the nonsense its power: Ireland’s history of defeat, miserable poverty and emigration. Sadly, that has been all too real, and continues to be so.

The Spinning Heart is set just after the worldwide financial collapse in the late aughts and details how the breakdown of credit and business growth affected Ireland. He does this by telling a rotating tale of 21 different stories told by people connected together through a local village in the provinces and the jobs and families that surround them (many of them connected to one of the sketchy building companies that left ghost towns half built all over the country). There are a few stories that continue throughout the book, but for the most part, these act like somewhat interconnected short stories.

Ryan makes each voice seem unique through a combination of the judicious use of dialect and specific Irish slang, a clear and usually quite sharp change of perspective each time, as well as a sensitively rendered rhythm of his words. His first-person point of view perspective was an excellent choice- this is the sort of story that needs the visceral, emotional, and yet inevitably quotidian reactions people are living with as they try to make sense of the disaster that has befallen them and their families.

The stories are almost uniformly quite dark- as, I would imagine, you might expect when you’re inside the heads of a large group of people whose future and hope has been taken away from them. Even characters who are routinely held up as examples to the community spend most of their time thinking about killing their relatives, committing crimes and other forms of magical thinking that will get them out of this mess that is not at all of their own making.

These are not, then, stories of the noble poor. No, Ryan does an excellent job of making them people, who are no better, or worse, as a group, than others. Many, many of them are small and petty. Others are not very bright. Still more are mean, gross, entitled or eternally complaining. But he also does a wonderfully heartbreaking job of making these people affect you anyway- because you see how they got that way, even if you only ever get hints of it. A passing familiarity with Ireland’s culture and history and a few words dropped, are, sadly, more than enough to give you the whole story. There’s all the repressive effects of prejudiced, isolated, powerful Catholicism here- still tearing rigid, disapproving parents apart from their children (especially the ones who ever make something of themselves, especially the ones who escape to the city). There’s the inevitable outcomes of a clearly ineffective education system, and an atmosphere where intelligence and success at school are viewed as something to be hidden, lest you get “above yourself” and think you’re better than anyone around you. (There’s a completely shattering scene where a child tells his father that he did well on a test at school, beaming at him and wanting congratulations and is beaten for the “sin of pride”.) And of course there’s the years and years of grinding poverty and unending work that sucks the life and soul out of everyone and gives their children lifelong grudges and hatreds that they pass on to their own children and so on down the line. The constant, open misogyny constantly shown towards women, where sex cannot be far from the conversation if they are ever mentioned at all. And of course the emigration. The emigration that had, miracle of all miracles, become actual immigration for a few years. It’s difficult to overstate what that would have meant to a country that has been forced to send its children away for generations in order to have a glimmer of a half of a chance of something. Their closest thing to hope has been to know they will never see their children again. And then there was immigration? I remember reading wondering stories in the New York Times about this trend, with Irish men and women beaming with pride, hardly able to believe it. And, after only a decade, this apparent miracle came crashing down on their heads…. sending them right back into the story they’d apparently finally escaped from.

Remember all the End of History stuff after the wall fell? The optimism and the hope? Basically this was the time the Irish hoped was the End of History. And of course, we know it wasn’t.

I would be lying if I said that these stories were powerful all on their own- they are in part affecting because they are basically mythic. They’re just one more example in a long line of stories we already know. We’ve heard these voices before- maybe not rendered in such a convincing way. Maybe not told with televisions and telephones in the background rather than ships and farms and famine cottages, but we all know how these stories end. They never end differently.

I was reading Angela Carter’s Bloody Chamber a few years ago, and there’s a part where Carter writes that she wishes that Juliet would just rise up and walk off her bier, that Tristan and Isolde would refuse to drink the love potion or die this time, refuse to be controlled by a seemingly inevitable fate that lead them to their doom every single time. I thought about that while reading this- part of its power is that we, too, have seen these characters go through this time after time and know how it ends, but we’re still watching- and why this particular iteration of it hurts so much, because it seems like finally they might escape this “inevitable” fate that history and our expectations set for them.

This isn’t a perfect book. Ryan’s writing and some of his characters can get occasionally repetitive. It is a short book, but probably could have been even a few chapters shorter (there were a few characters who didn’t add very much to the emotional resonance of the novel and were clearly there for plot reasons only), and the “spinning heart” metaphor never really made much sense/was particularly effective, or the next four times it was repeated. I also think that he strayed a little into some things that did not feel true- they feel like the kind of truth you see on the news or read op-ed pieces about, but not actually real life things.

But by and large, this was emotionally engaging, easy to fall into and easy to keep reading for hours until I finished. The stories will feel familiar, but they won’t feel cliched- they’ll, by and large, have the kind of truth that you look to find in first-person narratives, and they won’t cross the line into sentimentality. They press the feels button pretty effectively, and do it over and over again. It will take you an afternoon to read, and you’ll think about it for the rest of the day and I can’t imagine you’d feel you wasted your time.

Whether or not you have a connection to Ireland and its past, I think you’ll find a connection to these people easily. And that, after all, is one of the most profound things we can ask of literature.

[Berengaria · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

short review for busy readers:
A short literary novel about an Irish village reeling from the collapse of the building boom in the early 2000s. Told as a "collective narrative," 21 different characters chuck their bit of pain, fear and blame onto the fire as shocking events unfold one right after the other. Unfortunately, some voices are in non-standard Irish English, which slows down reading significantly for non-Irish/British Isles readers. And with that many characters, keeping a written list of who is who is a *must* to avoid confusion. No character list is provided.

in detail:
Bobby Mahon is a Good Man. In fact, one might think he's this village's version of a saint. Having survived a manic, abusive father, he's grown up to be a construction worker/odd job man who would give you the shirt off his back. He's the one man everyone respects and not just a few love.

When the building industry collapses and it comes out that the local contractor Bobby worked for was crooked - robbing workers of their pay and benefits and leaving a half-built estate in his wake as he flees abroad - it's up to Bobby to try and do what he can.

But even a saint can't save a nation from economic ruin.

21 different characters in their own chapters tell their version of the collapse and the eventual laying low of Bobby Mahon. They talk of their own innermost troubles, fears, hopes, but they also gossip about other characters, speculate and point the finger of blame and accusation. Some lie, some bitch and moan, some create the wildest fantasies, others are racked with guilt and still others plot a mad revenge.

"The Spinning Heart" is a wonderfully imagined and crafted novel about the viciousness that lies just under the surface of civility and social order. The voices are individually unique and the many characters all too human with their fear, hate, prejudice, and willingness to immediately see or think the worst of others, but not themselves.

It's this multitude where one might level some critique. There are simply too many voices. It's hard to keep track of who is who and related to whom and who said what, or speculated what, about whom. A character list would be a welcome and highly useful addition! (Otherwise: keeping notes is advised!)

Additionally, the beginning where we are being introduced to the village and situation drags somewhat. It's only around the middle of the book when the narrative starts to gain momentum until by the end its wheels are churning furiously.

Still, highly recommendable esp for anyone interested in recent Irish history or who enjoys a superbly well-crafted, multi-narrator story with a low page count (but not necessarily a quick read).

[Laysee · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Spinning Heart is a debut novella by Donal Ryan that describes a fractured community in a small rural Irish town in the wake of an economic recession. A local building firm, on which many families depend for their livelihood, has collapsed. The contractor has absconded, and left many workers jobless, in debt, and without their pension. In 160 pages, The Spinning Heart paints a cheerless and oppressive world from which I wish to flee. More than the bleakness of the financial circumstances is the suffocating inner world of the characters, a world that is choked with the debris of family dysfunction and latent aggression.

Each chapter is narrated in the voice of a character in the community who contributes his or her perspective of how lives are disrupted and destroyed when jobs and esteem are lost. We catch glimpses of the characters’ early life, which are mostly devastating accounts of maltreatment by alcoholic or abusive fathers that have repercussions on present day relationships. Of the twenty-one characters, the foreman Bobby Mahon stands out from the crowd as the salt-of-the earth individual that many respect for his industry, integrity and dependability. It is interesting to piece together, from disparate voices, who Bobby really is, who killed his father, and who kidnapped a young child from a crèche.

A novel like this weighs on the heart because there seems, in my view, little real distinction between the characters. Their experiences seem to coalesce into one crystallized, common, twisted identity. Bobby hates his drinking father (Frank) and wishes him dead. Frank, who as a child was beaten by his father for reporting perfect scores on a test, has developed ‘a knack for hitting people where it hurts’ with spiteful words. Trevor, a hypochondriac, talks about killing his mother. Lloyd, whose father left him when he was a child, kidnaps a preschool child and dreams of killing him. Denis keeps thinking of hitting his wife and eventually does worse than that and we learn that his father had laughed at and taunted him for losing a game at school. The sins of the father are predictably visited on the son.

In Bobby Mahon’s opening chapter, attention is drawn to a spinning heart in his father’s house: ‘There’s a red metal heart in the centre of the low front gate, skewered on a rotating hinge. It’s flaking now; the red is nearly gone. It needs to be scraped and sanded and painted and oiled. It still spins in the wind, though. I can hear it creak, creak, creak as I walk away. A flaking, creaking, spinning heart.’ Perhaps, this spinning heart is emblematic of the dross that is slowing eating away the lives of the inhabitants in this community.

I cannot say I care much about the characters in this story even though their plight should elicit pity. The apparent sameness of the drudgery felt over-stretched. I believe Ryan’s intention was to mirror the spoken language of the rural folks, but the usage of words (Irish dialect?) sometimes grated on me. I appreciated the story better when I read without paying too much attention to how things were said.

I am in the minority for my lack of enthusiasm with respect to this book. Please read the many positive reviews. The Spinning Heart is the winner of the Guardian First Book Prize and the Irish Book Award. Ryan has a unique voice and I should perhaps listen more closely. A first publication is cause for celebration; awards for a debut even more reason for celebration. I believe the best is yet to be.

[Kansas · Rating 4 out of 5]

https://kansasbooks.blogspot.com/2023...

“Me llamó la atención su nerviosismo; siempre pensé que se creía demasiado bueno para hablarnos. Y entonces descubrí todo lo que ocultaban sus ojos: timidez, miedo, dudas, tristeza. “

[...]

“Ese chico tiene algo; cuando te habla te mira de una forma, como incómodo, que dan ganas de abrazarlo; incluso cuando te mira a la cara, se le nota en la mirada una distancia que te hace pensar que lleva dentro una tristeza feroz, una bondad rara."


Este chico al que se refieren en ambas citas es Bobby Mahon, uno de los protagonistas de esta estupenda novela coral que brilla sobre todo por la estructura elegida por Donal Ryan. Bobby, fue capataz de una empresa constructora que quiebra en plena explosión de la burbuja, no solo quedándose él y sus trabajadores sin trabajo sino que después de que el dueño desapareciera del mapa se enteran de que durante años no había pagado las cuotas de la seguridad social. Tanto Bobby como sus compañeros son las victimas de una recesión que les estalla en la cara con todo lo que esto implica: empezar desde cero, falta de trabajo y de un tren de vida, que les pasará factura no solo a ellos sino que encadenará una serie de hechos dentro de la localidad donde viven.: “En esta urbanización hay cuarenta y cuatro casas. Yo vivo en la número veintitrés. En la número cuarenta vive una señora mayor. En las demás no vive nadie, solo los fantasmas de personas que nunca existieron.” Me recordó este "Corazón Giratorio" a la "Huir" de Evan Dara que editó Pálido Fuego este mismo año y de cómo un hecho concreto que hace estallar la economía de una pequeña localidad, terminará afectando al resto de sus habitantes.


“Ahora el último idiota va por ahí quejándose de que el país se va a la mierda. El país se va a la mierda, el país se va a la mierda, los mismos idiotas que hace unos años se quejaban de que el país había enloquecido por el dinero. Me encantaría decirles a todos que son una panda de miserables muertos de hambre, pero no puedo porque son los mismos imbéciles a los que iré a pedir trabajo si la cosa remonta."

[…]

“Así que me voy a Australia en el contexto de una grave recesión, por lo tanto no soy ni un bestia ni un vago, sino una figura trágica, una encarnación moderna del aparcero, postrado por la hambruna, desalojado de la diminuta parcela por el usurero, obligado a elegir entre el barco ataúd y la tumba.”


"Corazón Giratorio" es una novela coral estructurada en 21 capitulos, cada uno de ellos contado en primer persona por uno de los habitantes de una pequeña localidad irlandesa. El primer capitulo, será narrado por Bobby Mahon, en un flujo de conciencia de tormento interior no solo por la incertidumbre de un futuro negro, sino por los recuerdos de una infancia con un padre violento y alcoholico y una madre con la que no consiguió comunicarse. Los posteriores capitulos serán narrados por diferentes habitantes de la localidad y aunque ya no volvamos a encontrarnos con el flujo de conciencia de Bobby, siempre estará presente porque cada uno de los personajes que van surgiendo lo nombrarán, así que está continuamente presente e iremos conociendo el desarrollo de su historia a través de los demás. Cada uno de los veinte narradores restantes tienen una voz narrativa propia tanto en estilo como en la forma de expresarse y el lector en un acto de milagro total, se va adaptando a cada uno de ellos, cosa nada fácil. Estas voces interiores van expulsando sus miedos, sus esperanzas, experiencias del pasado, pero todo está encadenado, no hay nada gratuito en el sentido de que la voz del momento nos está contando lo que de verdad le parece importante; conoceremos a alguno de ellos en primera persona, y más tarde, en alusión por otro, así que en algún momento de la lectura, el lector es capaz de hacerse un mapa de este pequeño microcosmos donde cada uno de ellos brillará con luz propia.


“En ocasiones me falta el aire, el corazón me va a mil, noto un zumbido en los oídos, me doblo en dos y me agarro la cabeza con las manos; algunas veces, al apartar las manos de la cara, he notado que estaban mojadas de lágrimas. Pero eso no lo sabe nadie, ni lo sabrá.”


A pesar de este retrato coral de una pequeña localidad irlandesa que se encuentra repentinamente enfrentada a una crisis económica, Donal Ryan se las arregla para colar un elemento en la trama que subyacía y que va emergiendo poco a poco a medida que van avanzando los capítulos, una muerte, un secuestro, al que harán alusión los diferentes narradores, y poco a poco el lector podrá ir construyendo el puzzle. Sin embargo, no es esto en mi opinión lo de verdad importante de esta novela sino las voces narrativas, los flujos de conciencia de personajes que no solo van juntando las piezas del elemento dramático subyaciente, sino realmente que nos irán ayudando a juntar las piezas del puzzle de quién es realmente Bobby Mahon, un hombre fuerte y frágil a la vez, quizás anónimo pero una pieza esencial en el discurrir de la localidad donde vive. En este aspecto, Ryan ha construido una novela que transcurre en Irlanda, pero intuyo que podremos sentirnos fácilmente identificados desde cualquier otro lugar fuera de Irlanda. Esta es su grandeza.


"Ojalá pudiera hablarle tal como ella quiere, en vez de obligarla siempre a que adivine lo que estoy pensando.¿Por qué me cuesta encontrar las palabras?"

[…]

"De vez en cuando y sin un desencadenante se ponía a contarme cosas. En algunas ocasiones, cuando se ponía a hablar, yo ya estaba dormida en esa especie de duermevela en que no se está del todo inconsciente pero se puede soñar, tal vez con el libro todavía en la mano. En el silencio del dormitorio, la voz suave de Bobby, tan llena de ternura, llegaba a sorprender por lo inesperada y yo procuraba no moverme para no distraerlo. Ahora que lo pienso, recuerdo que mi inmovilidad de muerta, la forma en que contenía el aliento mientras él hablaba, eran las mismas que cuando intenta no asustar a un animal salvaje que se había colado en el jardín. Esa era la única manera."

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once again, Karen gets it right.

This could quite possibly be the best book released in early 2014 that goes completely under the radar. I hope I'm wrong about this, and that it gets all the attention it deserves.

This is a deceptively short novel about an Irish town living it large in a boom economy until the Dell, the source of the towns prosperity in the New Economy, decided to close up shop. At the center of this story is the foreman of a construction company that had been building estates (housing developments) until the housing market went bust, some shaky investments were made and the foreman and all the employees found themselves unemployed and without dole benefits because their boss hadn't been doing something with stamps that apparently in Ireland an employer needs to do for their employees so that they receive their benefits if they lose their jobs. I'm actually a little unclear on how all this works, but basically the owner of the construction company was paying all the employees off the books so when the company went bust they couldn't get any assistance.

The book opens with the foreman's story. Each chapter that follows is a different person from the town's story or observation about what's going on around him or her. What starts off for the first couple of chapters as disparate stories begin to mesh and as the novel unfolds the story of what is going on in the town takes shape in a way where the whole is bigger than all of the small details each of the characters stories seem to be giving in their own limited view of things.

It's quite a remarkable feat of storytelling the way Donal is able to help the reader construct a whole story by letting the reader fill in some of the gaps from the relationships between the different stories. The novel is a work of understated beauty. The richness of the book is surprising for a 160 page novel with more than a dozen characters all getting their own chance at being the center of attention.

In a perfect world this would be huge when it comes out this year, instead I think this is going to be one of those wonderful small press books that those lucky enough to find will cherish and enjoy but which the bigger book buying world will sadly miss out on.

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 3 out of 5]

In 2008, Ireland had an economic collapse with far reaching consequences. In this novel, Ryan presents a small village attempting to cope with the current recession. Each chapter is headed by one of the characters in the village, who tell their story about how they came to be in the positions they are in and how they are or are not coping with things. The character Booby, is the connecting thread, he is the one who knows all the different characters.

There were many of these stories that I liked, would have liked to have learned more about these characters, but in such a short novel, structured this way there is only so much that can be presented. Think I would have liked this more if the author had narrowed his focus and used a few less characters. Was a bit difficult to keep track of the different people and how they fit in. It was good, the language is very coarse but the narrations presented seemed to be very realistic.

[Lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the best book I've read in a very long time. I think it's a masterpiece. This is the first paragraph:

My father still lives back the road past the weir in the cottage I was reared in. I go there every day to see is he dead and every day he lets me down. He smiles at me; that terrible smile. He knows I'm coming to check is he dead. He knows I know he knows. He laughs his crooked laugh. I ask is he okay for everything and he only laughs. We look at each other for a while and when I can no longer stand the stench off him, I go away. Good luck, I say, I'll see you tomorrow. You will, he says back. I know I will.

It's that good from start to finish. Really.

Every chapter is narrated by a different voice from the town. Every voice is unique and intriguing. There is not one weak voice in the group, and each lends something important and distinct to the story. I do have my favorites: Bobby. Vasya. Realtin. Hillary. Seanie. Vasya is probably my very favorite.

This was so rich and artful. So authentic. Such a very good book. I read it and listened to the audio. The audio is outstanding. But reading it was also a wonderful experience. Truly, I cannot say enough about this book. It was so, so good.

And if you're still not convinced, consider what a real Irish reader has to say: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Spinning Heart is a novel uniquely written from various town people’s point-of-view. Donal Ryan is able to capture the harsh consequences of Ireland’s bleak economical environment. It takes a few pages to get into the Irish vernacular. Once you get into the rhythm, the book is easily read. Ryan is able to tell a story, and move the story along through each of the 21 town people’s story. Each has his/her own voice and stance. It’s a foreboding story, with one main character, Bobby, whose presence ties all the stories together. Bobby is a good character, trying to do the best he can with the cards he’s been given. From the start of the book, the reader knows this will not end well. I like books that enlighten me to world events that I previously knew nothing about. This book tells a story of the rural Irish people. Great read.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Spinning Heart is just tremendously, unbelievably good.  Set in post-Celtic Tiger Ireland, Donal Ryan chronicles the impact of the recession on a close-knit rural community.  With about twenty different points of view, the chapters are short, each a couple of pages long, and the novel is bookended by chapters from a married couple, Bobby and Triona.  Bobby is the novel's central character, each of the other characters connected to his story in some way, but it's hard to give a plot synopsis without giving anything away.  Suffice to say it opens with the brilliant lines “My father still lives back the road past the weir in the cottage I was reared in.  I go there every day to see is he dead and every day he lets me down.”

Though The Spinning Heart is Ryan's debut, this is my third novel by him, and I think it's safe to say that it's cemented him as one of my all-time favorites.  His prose is just top-notch, lyrical and evocative, and he has a way of capturing the distinct voice of each of his narrators while still allowing his own style to creep in - I just find it so compelling and pleasurable to read any of his books.  The plot isn't heavy in this one, though there's a kidnapping and a murder going on in the background, but it was still hard for me to put it down.  In fact, I'd recommend reading it in as few sittings as possible, lest you begin to forget the hundred names you're meant to be keeping track of.  Though I'd argue that if you forget who's who a couple of times, as long as you remember who Bobby is, the impact won't really be lessened.  This ultimately succeeds as a portrait of a community economically depressed, and is more about the overall effect that Ryan achieves with the panoply of voices, rather than the intricacies of the characters' lives.

Anyway, as I'm sure you can tell, I loved this. Maybe not QUITE as much as I loved All We Shall Know, but it's close.

[Blair · Rating 4 out of 5]

This earned its place on my to-read list because of a plethora of positive reviews from Goodreads friends and other respected sources; prior to that, I'd heard of it but had little interest, feeling it would be dry and worthy and depressing. It is actually almost the opposite of that - readable, entertaining and often funny (though still a bleak story), it reminded me of Tana French's Broken Harbour in more ways than one. Using a chorus of narrators - each taking their turn for a chapter, none repeated though many characters recur - it portrays an Irish community in the midst of the late-2000s financial crisis. Very short, a quick read, it is made even more enjoyable by its use of conversational language: there's plenty of dialect and slang but the context makes this easy to understand. The voices are impressively distinct given their number, and the similarity of the dialect used for many of them. The chapters work very well as little character portraits (confessions?) with snippets of history, but there is also an overarching plot, a story that turns on a couple of dramatic events. A mood is captured, a lasting impression is created. I might have started off feeling like this book was going to be a chore, but it changed my mind so effectively that it's secured my interest in Ryan's other/future work.

[Eh?Eh! · Rating 5 out of 5]

karen makes me buy books. I've found that if I pay attention to her reviews, noting any comparisons to other authors or books and how the book feels to her, matching it up against my personal tastes, it's always an amazing reading experience. My (weak) vow to avoid book buying is forgotten as soon as she does the written equivalent of looking at me with wide, earnest eyes that say "you will love this." One of my greatest pleasures is feeling that shift inside when something I'm reading moves me, cradling the cover and running my fingers down the edge...in pursuit of that, I pay attention to her.

She hit the mark with this one. I read her review and immediately marked it for purchase, someday, since she had obtained it months early through netgalley. I admit, I forgot about it in the mess of the to-read list and pile. But in conversation with her later, about other things, she brought this up again. I need the reminders.

Each chapter is the thoughts of a different person from a small village in Ireland, giving you the setting and an incredible development of the entire culture. The chapters move through time chronologically, so you become aware of folks and then something happens that everyone is thinking, gossiping, and worrying about. There isn't a big bang of an ending or conclusion. It is a short book but wow does it contain multitudes. This is one of those magical bags that are bigger on the inside than the outside.

I keep bringing it up, but I've developed a bitterness towards all things Irish due to being done wrong by an individual. Just before that, I got a first hand perspective of this nation of hardworking, somewhat insular, perverse, deeply proud, long historied, messy mess of human beings. Jaysus, indeed. While it is unique and lovely in many ways, it can also be unhappily calcified and just awful in many others. Certain stereotypes and separation of what is considered proper gendered behavior are ingrained, harmfully so. It makes me sad. I think much of the neuroses and broken minds presented in these chapters are built in to the Irish way. And perhaps this is my bitterness talking, since there's plenty of that everywhere in every culture, but it is probably worse there, where things are the way they are and swaying public opinion for certain things taken for granted here is impossible, small things, important things. Things that tear a person up on the level of the home and immediate family.

Wonderful, short book. karen is right, as always. Worth her weight in gold, that young one is.

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 5 out of 5]

It took me the length of one U2 album to read this novel of connected stories, but it was not light reading. It takes place in recent Ireland, in a small town suffering economic collapse after the housing market didn't have the expected boom, and most men in the town are without employment (or unemployment benefits.) Each story is told by a different character but the story moves forward. I loved the different voices, the different perspectives, and I hope this book makes the Booker shortlist.

Ryan has a great capture of personalities. Take this blurb on Bobby's father, from the son's perspective (I also like this one because it sounds so familiar):
"I'll never forgive him for the sulking, though, and the killing sting of his tongue. He ruined every day of our lives with it... Sober, he was a watcher, a horror of a man who missed nothing and commented on everything. Nothing was ever done right or cooked right or said right or bought right or handed to him properly.... We couldn't breathe right in a room with him. We couldn't talk freely or easily."

Most of the characters become exactly this familiar, this known to the reader, within the vicinity of just a few short pages. Excellent writing for a first novel by Donal Ryan!

[Diane Barnes · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've read a couple of Donal Ryan's novels and really liked them, so when I learned of a new one coming out later this year I knew I wanted to read it. A little research told me that it was a sequel of sorts to his first book, The Spinning Heart. Since my library didn't have it on the shelf I opted for Interlibrary Loan.

This was a devastating little book clocking in at 160 pages. Told in the voices of 21 Irish men and women in a small village during a severe economic crisis, we find out the inner workings of families, co-workers, parents and children, some of them heartbreaking. It reminded me a bit of The Field, told in the voices of people in a graveyard, where we get an entire story in bits and pieces, but in this case only one of the persons was a dead man.

Since I said above that this was devastating, I'll confuse things a bit by saying it was also very funny. Donal Ryan does that in his books, giving you more than one perspective and ending up with a wonderful story. So now I'm ready for his next one.

[Rebecca · Rating 4 out of 5]

In his impressive debut, Donal Ryan captures the myriad voices of an Irish community in financial and moral crisis. The novel is like a chorus of 21 first-person narratives. Ryan features representatives from every sector of the community: an old woman, a little girl, a Russian immigrant, a single mother, a police officer, a schizophrenic man, and so on. He triumphs at giving each character a distinctive voice, varying by level of diction, thickness of Irish dialect, staid or gossipy tone, and each person’s particular preoccupations. The context may not be immediately apparent, but it starts to fit together like a jigsaw puzzle.

(An excerpt of my full review is available to non-subscribers at BookBrowse.)