I could love Byrne’s memoir strictly for its gorgeous language, but it’s so much more—the story of his life (thus far) is a remarkable recounting of an ascent from an ordinary childhood to a life of extraordinary accomplishment. The opening chapter literally propelled me into the Ireland of his youth. Through the precision and poetry of his descriptions, I could see, hear, taste, feel, and smell.
Beyond the language are Byrne’s deeply insightful observations of what living in his time and place has meant. I read the book first, then listened to the audiobook, narrated by Byrne himself. What a treasure his voice is—bringing his story to life in the lilting cadence of his Irish origins.
Walking with Ghosts is the stunningly evocative memoir by Irish actor and Hollywood star, Gabriel Byrne.
'Dreamy, lyrical and utterly unvarnished' - Colm Toibin
As a young boy growing up in the outskirts of Dublin, Gabriel Byrne sought refuge in a world of imagination among the fields and hills near his home, at the edge of a rapidly encroaching city. Born to working-class parents and the eldest of six children, he harboured a childhood desire to become a priest. When he was eleven years old, Byrne found himself crossing the Irish Sea to join a seminary in England. Four years…
I must rate this novel in stories as a tie with Walking with Ghosts. Bonazzoli’s gift of language shines through in this collection of eleven stories linked by place—the characters’ homes surround the eponymous Maine pond of the title.
Most extraordinary is her ability to distinguish each character’s voice—including one written from the pond’s point of view! I love the way Bonazzoli elevates the ordinary lives of those confronting loss, trauma, and everyday struggles to a sacred meditation on what it means to live.
On the shores of Consecration Pond, a widow seeks forgiveness from her husband’s ghost, a war veteran struggles to make sense of his neighbor’s death, and a boy’s self-imposed rite of passage nearly costs him his life. The eleven linked stories in Consecration Pond explore pivotal moments in the lives of a small community of characters who make their home along a pond in rural Maine. Together, the stories offer a meditation on loss and our potential to consecrate what remains.
Publishers Weekly called Consecration Pond “poetic and introspective . . . This is a solid, meditative collection of interconnected…
Black’s book—one of the Bookmarked series in which writers reflect on the book most influential on their work (and in their life)—is part insightful commentary on Woolf’s novel, part advanced primer on the craft of writing, and part confessional on how the novel intersects with her own life.
Traditional books on the craft of writing are fine as far as they go; beginning writers need to understand the basics. What I found most profound about Black’s observations was how deeply a book can affect a reader. It reminded me of why I first started to write—to create work in which even one reader might find some connection, some solace, some reason to go on.
“This astonishing new book, by the brilliant Robin Black is an intimate meditation on reading and writing, aftermath and possibility, the tension between the never-stable, endlessly interpretable depths of a book and the fragility of life, the finality of death. I emerged from this breathtaking work with a transformed understanding of both Woolf’s masterpiece and the stream of consciousness in which we swim, “together and alone.”—Karen Russell
“Reading Robin Black’s astute and enlightening meditation on Mrs. Dalloway is like eavesdropping on a mesmerizing literary conversation, but one in which the participants are not two readers but a reader and a…
My book is an elegiac meditation on the will to survive. Tor, a beluga whaler, and his wife, Astrid, a botanist specializing in Arctic flora, are stranded during the dark season of 1937-38 at his remote whaling station in the Svalbard archipelago when they misjudge ice conditions and fail to rendezvous with the ship meant to carry them back to their home in southern Norway.
Beyond enduring the Arctic winter’s twenty-four-hour night, the couple must cope with the dangers of polar bears, violent storms, and bitter cold, as well as Astrid’s unexpected pregnancy.
The novel concerns the impact of humans on pristine environments, the isolation of mental illness, the consolation of religious faith, and the solace of storytelling.
