Arts

Irish Books

by Christopher Murray

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About the show

Each episode focuses on a single book to offer in-depth exploration of contemporary Irish writing, one of the the dominant presences in book shops, book groups, and writers’ festivals around the world. Guest experts on Irish culture join author and critic Chris Murray to explore the techniques, cultural resonances, and deeper meanings of the nation’s recent literature. Irish Books tackles prize winners and some of the biggest names in Irish writing today while also calling attention to emerging voices that deserve notice. Listeners will learn more about the books they loved and find out what they should read next. Host @drchrismurray.bsky.social (Bluesky) Explore more from Irish Books Podcast 🌐 Website: https://irishbookspodcast.com 📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/irishbookspodcast 📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/irishbookspodcast Follow the show in your favourite podcast app so each new conversation arrives the day it’s released. The Irish Books Podcast is supported by the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Monash University. Produced by East Coast Studio.

Latest episodes

Season 2 Trailer

October 8, 2026 · 2 min

Hear in-depth discussions of recent Irish books that are worth reading, across a range of genres. Expert guests get to the heart of books you know and give you ideas of what contemporary Irish literature to read next. Season 2 covers a…
Connections Severed and Retied: Colum McCann's Twist

June 17, 2026 · 47 min

Killian Quigley, an expert in oceanic humanities, is Chris's guest to discuss McCann's deep-sea adventure. Writer Anthony Fennell joins a vessel that repairs the information cables that run deep under the ocean, hoping for material for an…
Tragic Balladry in the Wild West: Kevin Barry's The Heart in Winter

June 3, 2026 · 39 min

Maebh Long - Kevin Barry fan and Eamon Cleary Chair of Irish Studies at the University of Otago - joins Chris to discuss The Heart in Winter. Barry's tale of lovers on the run is set in the American midwest in 1891 but looks back to Irish…
Is the Sky Blue? Anna Burns's Milkman

May 20, 2026 · 56 min

This remarkable novel presents us with a speaker who is reluctant to tell her story. Our young narrator's crisis begins when a republican paramilitary known as the Milkman begins to pay her unwanted attention. Milkman's courtship resembles…
Cracked Lens over a Cold Case: Sebastian Barry's Old God's Time

May 6, 2026 · 59 min

Kevin Foster, an expert in war narratives at Monash University, helps Chris examine a quirky veteran: the hero of Old God's Time fought in the Malayan Emergency and is a retired Garda. He was also brought up in a Christian Brothers home…
Placing the Pieces of Grief and Love: Sally Rooney's Intermezzo

April 22, 2026 · 54 min

Chris's guest to discuss Intermezzo is Madeleine Callaghan (Maddy), Senior Lecturer in the School of English at the University of Sheffield. Maddy explains that Rooney's title alludes to the opening strategies of chess, in which players…
Excavating the Hidden Self: Adrian Duncan's The Gorgeous Inertia of the Earth

April 8, 2026 · 47 min

Lucy Collins of University College Dublin explains that Duncan refuses what we expect of a novel. The ideas of visual art matter more here than the plot and character that usually drive fiction. Our focus is on the restorative sculptor…
Back from Brooklyn: Colm Tóibín's Long Island

March 25, 2026 · 48 min

25 years after the events of Brooklyn, Eilis Lacey has integrated to American life successfully, but faces a crisis in consequence of her husband's infidelity, a crisis that propels her home to Enniscorthy. Guest Matthew Ryan, a specialist…