A Star Called Henry, by Roddy Doyle (Vintage, £6.99 in UK)In the first volume of what he promises will be a trilogy called The Last Roundup, Roddy Doyle unpicks the stitches of the tatty…Sat Sept 23 2000 - 01:00
Charming Billy, by Alice McDermott (Bloomsbury, £6.99 in UK)THERE can be few prospects more dismal than a book about an alcoholic Irishman and his extended family - unless, perhaps, the…Sat Sept 16 2000 - 01:00
A Haunted Heart, by John MacKenna (Picador, £6.99 in UK)BALLITORE, Co Kildare has a real, and eminently respectable, Quaker past, but in this reflective, passionate novel John MacKenna…Sat Sept 16 2000 - 01:00
Wild Decembers, by Edna O'Brien (Phoenix, £6.99 in UK)Sex and solicitors make the earth move in this tale of overheated emotions in the Irish countrysideSat Sept 09 2000 - 01:00
Ladies' Night at Finbar's Hotel, edited by Dermot Bolger (Picador, £6.99 in UK)`Nuns, thugs and rock stars jostle in the corridors..Sat Sept 09 2000 - 01:00
The Wise and Foolish Virgins, by Don Hannah (Granta, £6.99 in UK)Considering that it's one of the most sparsely populated countries on earth, Canada produces an extraordinary number of first…Sat Sept 02 2000 - 01:00
Fish of perfect pitchYou might imagine that, on a fine autumn day with the sun beaming genially from a lightly-glazed sky and the sea at its sparkling…Sat Sept 02 2000 - 01:00
Music & Silence, by Rose Tremain (Vintage, £6.99 in UK)Reluctant to step into a historical novel - especially if it's set in 17th-century Denmark? Then don't read the opening page …Sat Sept 02 2000 - 01:00
Girls' Night In, edited by Fiona Walker, Jessica Adams and Chris Banby (HarperCollins, £5.99 in UK)What do young women romance writers think about these days? Much the same things they've always thought about, if this collection…Sat Aug 26 2000 - 01:00
In Secret Sin, by Rose Doyle (Pan, £6.99 in UK)There are two hurdles of disbelief that readers of Rose Doyle's sixth novel must crossSat Aug 26 2000 - 01:00
Mary Swann by Carol Shields (Fourth Estate, £6.99 in UK)Depending where you stand on intelligent, articulate novels that poke fun at the lit-crit brigade, you'll either welcome this…Sat Aug 12 2000 - 01:00
Losing Nelson, by Barry Unsworth (Penguin, £6.99 in UK)We like to think that we have no time for heroes - have no need of them, perhaps - but in this accomplished, unsettling novel…Sat Aug 05 2000 - 01:00
Home Truths, by David Lodge (Penguin, £5.99 in UK)Will David Lodge never go away? He seems to have written innumerable (well, actually, 10) novels about immensely unpleasant people…Sat Aug 05 2000 - 01:00
`He has a tendency to be not that interesting'`Get over here now," says the mildly panicky message on the mobile. "We're running ahead of scheduleSat Jul 29 2000 - 01:00
A drop of the heart stuffTall, shaven-headed, clad in Nike black from top to toe, the bass looks as if he might be about to play in goal for France at…Sat Jul 22 2000 - 01:00
Encore Provence, by Peter Mayle (Penguin, £6.99 in UK)Even if - perhaps especially if - you've never been within an ass's roar of Provence, Peter Mayle's amiable tales of overgrown…Sat Jul 22 2000 - 01:00
Bear with usFacing Up, by Bear Grylls, read by the author (Macmillan, 2 tapes, 3 hrs, £8.99 in UK)Sat Jul 15 2000 - 01:00
The Last Life by Claire Messud (Picador, £5.99 in UK)Like all teenagers, Sagesse is wry, introspective, self-obsessedSat Jul 15 2000 - 01:00
Fasting, Feasting by Anita Desai (Vintage, £6.99 in UK)The curtain rises on an elderly Indian couple, swinging gently on their verandah as pigeons coo on the balcony above: the incarnation…Sat Jul 08 2000 - 01:00
The Omnibus, by Nick Hornby (Indigo, £9.99 in UK)`That," commented a colleague on seeing me make gleefully off with this hefty tome, "is an awful lot of Nick HornbySat Jul 01 2000 - 01:00
Stories worth the tellingAt ten in the morning her bun, her suit and her make-up are immaculate and she has already "done" TV3Sat Jun 24 2000 - 01:00
44, by Peter Sheridan (Pan, £6.99 in UK)The defining moment in this appealing study of a gritty, grotty Dublin childhood is when young Shero stands swaying on the roof…Sat Jun 17 2000 - 01:00
For the Relief of Unbearable Urges, by Nathan Englander (Faber, £6.99 in UK)Less a collection of stories than a theme and variation on the subject of Jewishness, Nathan Englander's astonishing debut makes…Sat Jun 10 2000 - 01:00
Be Cool by Elmore Leonard (Penguin, £6.99 in UK)Elmore Leonard has to be the coolest 75-year-old on the planetSat May 27 2000 - 01:00
A House Full of Women, by Joan O'Neill (Coronet, £5.99 in UK)I honestly didn't think they wrote - or, at least, published - books like this any moreSat May 20 2000 - 01:00
Tomcat in Love, by Tim O'Brien (Flamingo, £6.99 in UK)Tim O'Brien's seventh book comes garlanded with the sort of terrifying ropes of adjectives - "savage... picaresque..Sat May 20 2000 - 01:00
Irish-America comes out in force for night of island artsSay what you like about the John FMon May 15 2000 - 01:00
Almost Heaven by Marianne Wiggins (Anchor, £6.99 in UK)Holden Garfield is a foreign correspondent shattered by the horrors he has witnessed in SrebrenicaSat May 06 2000 - 01:00
Ink by John Preston (Black Swan, £6.99 in UK)`You can't have writer's block," he said. "You're not a writer. This is journalismSat May 06 2000 - 01:00
Crooked Field, by Colm O'Gaora (Picador, £6.99 in UK)The field, or rather fields, of the title play a central role in this elegiac study of a father-daughter relationship in a remote…Sat Apr 29 2000 - 01:00
Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee (Vintage, £6.99 in UK)An arrogant, 50-something lecturer in Romantic Poetry at the Technical University of Cape Town has a desultory affair with a …Sat Apr 22 2000 - 01:00
Renee Fleming: Strauss Heroines (Decca)Everything about these ladies is OTT: the heady last-rose-of-summer outpourings of the middle-aged Marschallin; the feisty feminism…Sat Apr 15 2000 - 01:00
Dorothea Roschmann: Handel: German arias (Harmonia Mundi)`Aria:... the word undoubtedly comes from the Air, not only because the vehicle of all sound is to be found there, but also because…Sat Apr 15 2000 - 01:00
This Sporting Life, by David Storey (Vintage, £6.99 in UK)From the opening paragraph, a literally stunning description of a clash between two players, to the final scene of grotty bodies…Sat Apr 15 2000 - 01:00
A feast of slip-sliding and glidingAnyone who got hooked on this year's European Figure Skating Championships, covered way beyond saturation point on Eurosport …Sat Apr 08 2000 - 01:00
The Water Star by Philip Casey (Picador, £6.99 in UK)This elegiac novel casts a gentle - but discerning - eye on the lives and loves of Irish and other exiles in a London shattered…Sat Apr 01 2000 - 01:00
Celestial Navigation, by Anne Tyler (Vintage, £6.99 in UK)One of a trio of Tyler paperback re-releases from Vintage, Celestial Navigation (1996) begins with a character so weird you wonder…Sat Mar 25 2000 - 00:00
The whydunnit of whodunnitsHere is a blueprint for the career of a successful psychologist who wants to specialise in behavioural pediatricsSat Mar 18 2000 - 00:00
A Recipe for Bees by Gail Anderson-Dargatz (Virago, £6.99 in UK)The author of the bestselling The Cure for Death by Lightning returns to rural British Columbia and its themes of alienation, …Sat Mar 11 2000 - 00:00
The Dark Side of the Sun by Elizabeth Palmer (Century, £10.00 in UK)They don't write them like this any more: most historical novels nowadays boast some kind of postmodern spin, but Elizabeth Palmer…Sat Feb 26 2000 - 00:00
Shadow-Box by Antonia Logue (Bloomsbury, £6.99 in UK)So much has been written about this novel, from the huge advance its author received before it was written, to the Irish Times…Sat Feb 19 2000 - 00:00
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver (Faber & Faber, £7.99 in UK)An American Baptist preacher brings his wife and four daughters to a remote missionary outpost in the Belgian Congo in 1959Sat Feb 05 2000 - 00:00
Duane's Depressed by Larry McMurtry (Orion, £6.99 in UK)In small-town Texas, walking just isn't an option: everybody knows that. You drive everywhere in your pickupSat Feb 05 2000 - 00:00
Net challenge faces the music industryThe music industry will have to change its tune to survive the challenges posed by e-commerce, according to a new report by Andersen…Wed Feb 02 2000 - 00:00
Tulip Fever, by Deborah Moggach (Vintage, £6.99 in UK)In the early 17th century Amsterdam is gripped by a passion for tulipsSat Jan 29 2000 - 00:00
More flab than fizzI know, I know, I know, I know, I know. Pauline McLynn isn't Mrs Doyle really. She's a totally separate personSat Jan 29 2000 - 00:00
