by Siobhan Dowd
This is my favorite Siobhan Dowd book and it's a terrible shame that Ms. Dowd lost her fight with cancer before its publication.The book's main character, Fergus McCann, deals with some weighty subjects - the Troubles, a brother in prison and on a hunger strike, an uncle that's not who Fergus though...
The story takes place in the 1980s in the midst of "the troubles" in ireland. 18-year-old Fergus McCan lives in N. Ireland with his parents and two younger sisters. His older brother Joey has been recently imprisoned for working with the provisional IRA. He is serving a ten-year sentence. Bobby Sand...
The year is 1981 and Fergus is 18 years old and studying for his exams, hoping to score the three B’s he’ll need if he wants to move away from his home, on the border between the Irish Republic and Northern Ireland, to study to become a doctor.He is up in the mountains, stealing peat with his uncle,...
in a sentence or so: Fergus is surrounded by uncertainty. uncertainty about what will happen to his brother Joe in prison. uncertainty about the new girl who has drifted into his life. uncertainty about the body he found in the bog. yeah, Fergus has a lot of uncertainty to figure out.Fergus is your ...
by Siobhan DowdOpening line--"They'd stolen a march on the day."I haven't read much historical fiction that's set in the recent past, so this was a new experience for me. It does start me wondering about where the line is drawn between historical and contemporary fiction. Five years? Ten years? ...
This is the story of Fergus, a young Irish man who is torn between loyalty to his country, his family, and to himself. There are actually 3 different stories going on at the same time, which makes for a can't-put-it-down-what-is-going-to-happen-next read. I learned a few Irish terms and a little a...
This surprised me as being a book I very quickly found myself getting into.Dowd's style is simple, but beautiful - like being gently cushioned and guided through the story she tells. It is set on the border between North Ireland and South Ireland, in 1981 when the Troubles in Ireland were strong and...
This was an interesting little read, beautifully written, complex and interesting characters, I was sadden to hear that the author passed before this book was published.
Bog Child is a skillful encapsulation of two historic time periods that your average state-side student would be entirely ignorant of. Iron-age Europe and the latter 20th century political Troubles of Ireland. I particularly liked how the two seeming unrelated events drew tighter and tighter simil...
I recognized the title on the new shelf***The juxtaposition of the Troubles and the question of what happened to the bog child made for fascinating reading. I hadn't realized that there had been such a long quiet time and that violence had only started up recently when I became aware of it. And what...
Log in with Facebook 
