Irish Girls About Town |
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Maeve Binchy, Marian Keyes, Cathy Kelly, et al
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Pages: 400 (Paperback)
ISBN: 1903650267
Pub: Pocket Books/TownHouse
Pub date: 2002-04-02
Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 118897
Reader Reviews:
A great find! (14/15 people found this helpful)
I recently bought 4 books with short stories by Irish and Scottish women -- and the first two were a disappointment. Then I started reading the third one, IRISH GIRLS ABOUT TOWN, and what a difference! Now, this was exactly my cup of tea :)
I especially enjoyed three stories -- The 28th Day by Catherine Barry, The Union Man by Tina Reilly and The Ring Circle by Martina Devlin. (I was disappointed by the fact that Maeve Binchy's story seemed to be an extract from one of her novels...)
"The 28th Day" is a fantastic description of PMT. How clever to think of that subject matter! Yes, really! You have to read it to see what I mean. Barry treats her character with such humour and understanding. An absolutely wonderful short story -- and I am most definitely going to order Barry's novels, now that I have "discovered" her!
The same goes for Reilly. After reading her brilliant story, "The Union Man" (about a woman married to a "mother's boy"), I want to read more of her work. Both these writers have a way of getting a serious point across by using humour and irony. And they write about things so many women have experienced, no matter what country they live in. Perfect!
I loved Devlin's "The Ring Circle" for similar reasons as the first two writers I mentioned. She deals with such an ordinary subject matter (what to do with the wedding band after a divorce) in such a comic way. I'm sure many of us have been in that situation. What DO we do with the ring when the marriage is over?
Oh, these are writers you simply MUST get to know. I discovered them by chance ... and I am sooooooo glad!
A hit & miss affair (25/28 people found this helpful)
As an avid reader I often run out of my own books & turn to my wife's collection. She had recently bought this but had not yet read it so I though I would give it a go (anything written by Maeve Binchy is worth reading).
There are many different stories, with different themes in this collection but I think they can easily be separated in to two sections - very, good stories & very, bad stories.
The good ones are written by the names headlining the book (Maeve Binchy, Marian Keyes, Cathy Kelly etc). These stories (& a couple of others) are very well-written, very funny & thoroughly enjoyable.
The bad stories...well, the less said about them the better. They are poorly written, not at all funny & completely unbelievable. Too many of the writers evidently believed they had a good idea & forced a story out of it.
In summary, I would compare this book to most compilation CD's. You buy the CD for a handful of gem's....& you fast-forward through the fillers.
Well worth the money (23/25 people found this helpful)
Buying this book is money well spent as it's the type of collection you'll want to leave on the bedside locker and dip in and outt as you please. Alll the alll favourites are featured such as Maeve Binchy, Marian Keyes, Sarah Webb and Cathy Kelly but I also enjoyed the stories of the less famous writers such as Annie Sparrow and Marisa Mackle. Highly recommended.
A holiday read - even if you're not on holidays! (40/41 people found this helpful)
I had meaning to buy this book for a long time and I must say when I got around to purchasing it I wasn't dissappointed. Apart from one or two stories which didn't exactly 'set my world alight' this was over all a great collection by Irish women writers and I was delighted to discover some new Irish writers like Catherine Barry, Julie Parsons, Marisa Mackle and Colette Caddle.
*A real girlsbook!!!* (24/25 people found this helpful)
Hilarious, funny and interesting, is what I think about this book! It is very funny, and I couldn't help laughing out loud when I was reading it. Still it seems like something's missing! Maybe reality is missing. I mean, I must be honest and say, that I can't imagine anything like these stories happening for me. But maybe that just makes them even more fun?!? All in all it is a must for girls!!!
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Categories
Amazon.co.uk places this book into the following categories:
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> Short Stories
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> Authors, A-Z -> K -> Keyes, Marian
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> General
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> Contemporary Fiction: 1970 Onwards -> Chick Lit
Books -> Subjects -> Fiction -> Contemporary Fiction: 1970 Onwards -> Women’s Popular Fiction
Books -> Subjects -> Romance -> Authors, A-Z -> B -> Binchy, Maeve
Books -> Subjects -> Romance -> Authors, A-Z -> K -> Kelly, Cathy
Books -> Refinements -> Language (feature_browse-bin) -> English
Books -> Refinements -> Age (feature_two_browse-bin)
Books -> Refinements -> Format (binding_browse-bin) -> Paperback