She Moves Through The Boom

by Ann Marie Hourihane

What’s happening in Ireland? Behind the triumphalist headlines of the boom, there are changes going on – in the way people work, speak, eat, even the way they think – that cannot be quantified by statistics nor squared with the hollow cliché of the Celtic Tiger. She Moves through the Boom is a book about these intangible changes, and it paints a picture the newspapers and tourism propagandists are missing. Ann Marie Hourihane talks to working mothers, Mullingar wine importers, the organizer of a rural water scheme, shop assistants, a Nigerian preacher, teenaged removal men, and other exemplary – because ordinary – members of Irish society. These people aren’t talking about the boom; they’re living it, sometimes without even noticing, and they speak its languages – of social liberation, stubborn tradition, banal consumerism, and others. She Moves through the Boom presents a quirky, kaleidoscopic view of contemporary Ireland. By turns hilarious and dark, it is a fascinating snapshot of a singular moment in our history.

Genres: Nonfiction

250 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2002

Reviews

[Alice · Rating 2 out of 5]

Really interesting to read about this era that I don't quite remember, a culture that I'm not quite within. Reassuring to witness the hundreds of different paths that people can follow. A harsh reminder of how much money governs everything, however much being in the arts makes you rethink this concept over and over. (I picked this book up because I liked the cover, and am only now realising that it is a stylised pound - brilliant graphic element) Moments that stand out to me - description of shopping centres, rich, giant homes named after Irish writers, the Garda investigation, the monotony and depsair of call centre jobs, the voice actor. Funny to hear people yap about their jobs with extremely specialised and niche knowledge - it's taken over my life completely, isn't it strane that you don't give this product or service a second thought?

[U. Cronin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wry, excellently observed account of Ireland's mocha years, written at the height of the Celtic Tiger, when things were so bubbly (and getting bubblier) that 2008's crash was unimaginable. Exactly what you'd expect from Anne Marie Hourihane, who's razor-sharp wit and cynic's eye have been doing the public some service down through the years. This book will be required reading in the future for those wishing to understand the mania that overtook the Irish from the mid nineties until "de crash".

[Jaylia3 · Rating 3 out of 5]

A idiosyncratic, in the trenches account of how Ireland was changed by its economic boom--I decided to read this book after hearing the author interviewed on the radio recently; she's writing a sequel called something like She Moves Through the Gloom, or Doom about what has happened since the collapse. Part of the fun of reading is trying to decode Irish life references and idioms.