Review
"Funny, moving and beautifully written" (Edna O'Brien)
"[An] extraordinarily accomplished first novel. here is a new Irish writer of the very first order. Donal Ryan is the real deal. . a brilliantly realised, utterly resonant state-of-the-nation landscape . Ryan's feat is considerable. Narrative and character information is distributed among so many different voices and yet we never feel at a loss. Even the characters on the margins of the story . add compelling colour and texture. Best of all, Ryan's ear for speech is acute. . Given a novel as brilliantly realised as The Spinning Heart, I see no reason to look anywhere but the present. For Donal Ryan, the future is now." (Declan Hughes Sunday Independent)
"Donal Ryan's precise and evocative debut . is a textured account of a community as it was during a brief moment of time. . unexpectedly tender . Ryan's prism of life and lives is compellingly humane. . This is an exciting, relevant and believable contemporary novel about the lost and the wounded that listens to the present without discarding either the sins of the fathers or the literary legacy of the past." (Eileen Battersby The Irish Times)
"There's a powerful sense of place and shared history binding Ryan's many voices, their inner and outer selves, distilling a linguistic richness comparable to Under Milk Wood. . . . Ryan's novel . . . seems to draw speech out of the deepest silences; the testimony of his characters rings rich and true - funny and poignant and banal and extraordinary - and we can't help but listen." (The Guardian)
"Powerful and affecting . . . [a] superb, unforgettable and topical debut." (The Times)
"[An] extraordinarily accomplished first novel. here is a new Irish writer of the very first order. Donal Ryan is the real deal. . a brilliantly realised, utterly resonant state-of-the-nation landscape . Ryan's feat is considerable. Narrative and character information is distributed among so many different voices and yet we never feel at a loss. Even the characters on the margins of the story . add compelling colour and texture. Best of all, Ryan's ear for speech is acute. . Given a novel as brilliantly realised as The Spinning Heart, I see no reason to look anywhere but the present. For Donal Ryan, the future is now." (Declan Hughes Sunday Independent)
"Donal Ryan's precise and evocative debut . is a textured account of a community as it was during a brief moment of time. . unexpectedly tender . Ryan's prism of life and lives is compellingly humane. . This is an exciting, relevant and believable contemporary novel about the lost and the wounded that listens to the present without discarding either the sins of the fathers or the literary legacy of the past." (Eileen Battersby The Irish Times)
"There's a powerful sense of place and shared history binding Ryan's many voices, their inner and outer selves, distilling a linguistic richness comparable to Under Milk Wood. . . . Ryan's novel . . . seems to draw speech out of the deepest silences; the testimony of his characters rings rich and true - funny and poignant and banal and extraordinary - and we can't help but listen." (The Guardian)
"Powerful and affecting . . . [a] superb, unforgettable and topical debut." (The Times)
Book Description
This stunning debut has won major acclaim, winning the Guardian First Book Award 2013, Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards 2012, and was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize 2013.
