Told in sparse, droll language this is a beautifully painted portrayal of the transience of time and place when young. Neighbouring farms are owned by wider family, some more well off than others but all reliant on the land. Each of us carried a shard of that iron in our hearts. We learn that Marcus has been married for twenty-five years to Mairead, a teacher at a local school. As time passes, Ní Ghríofa’s obsession with Eibhlín Dubh verges on the unhealthy – a trait that is not unknown to her – and yet what she discovers is fascinating to read. RTÉ is not responsible for the content of external internet sites. And this quote picks up many of the themes of the book: its concentration on storytelling and remembrance – family stories and legends, the war stories that the narrator’s Father uses to draw on his lessons for life, the interpretation of dreams, constant reminiscing on those that fell in the Wars, Finnish folklore particularly around a witch like figure, the stories in which the narrator increasingly takes refuge; the illustrations which while clearly relating to the story often have a deeper dark fairy tale element (for example – a dinosaur skull buried under the roots of a tree, a ghost figure on a sled); the juxtaposition of the darkness of much of the life of the narrator with the absurd incidents that occur and the dry humour with which she relates them. Eventually she must accept that she has found everything available to her about Eibhlín Dubh.

For centuries this place defied her nightmare, in the laughter and song and turf smoke that continued to lilt on the breeze.

The future – where you would like to see your small press going? It was a terrible fate to be ummikko.

I have always been interested in the way people tell or remember things …… … my art often relates to childhood and storytelling ….. Arja gave me some old photographs for inspiration, and I also had my Dad’s, rather thin photo album to look at … I tried to make illustrations that would work with the text but also as separate pictures that could somehow tell a story of their own … I appreciate pictures that have both seriousness or a sort of darkness, combined with humour or absurdity in them.

Blot.

She visits places where they lived but often finds little remains. “It’s the war” [her mother] said father’s nerves are shot. In the dread half-light, she sees her home crumpled to ruin, the lands all shrivelled, the animals vanished, the air deathly silent, 'The Gearagh all withering, / without a growl left of your hounds / nor the sweet chirp of birds’.

“My family had lived within these hills for centuries […] every path I followed had been written by the bodies of others, the course of every track sculpted by the footfall of those who came before us.”.

Doireann Ní Ghríofa is an Irish writer. “My weeks are decanted between the twin forces of milk and text, weeks that soon pour into months, and then into years. The narrator’s reaction both to her father’s continuing anger and the ummikko issue is a two fold withdrawal. I felt that the family’s struggles to maintain this dual identity while also not drawing attention to themselves could serve as a metaphor for the difficult path of neutrality that Finland navigated after the World War. The Iron Age, her debut novel was based on notes for a graphic novel, and was then written as a short story which was a finalist for the 2014 Davy Byrnes Short Story Award (won by Sara Baume) before being developed into this short novel/novella.

Despite its apparently mundane subject matter it is an engaging and compelling read. The second half of the book chronicles the start of the family’s life in Sweden – which in many ways takes an even darker turn. The book closes with the poem that set her on this journey – transcribed in both Gaeilge (Irish) and an English translation. Ní Ghríofa then set about excising the men and their concerns to see what remained. Thank you Lisa for answering my questions, and congratulations on the part you and Sarah played in getting that other literary prize, The Man Booker, to accept submissions from Irish-published novels. The Caoineadh is as deeply personal for its author as A Ghost in the Throat is for Ní Ghríofa. The clouds seem a flood, suspended far overhead. Back at my own clothesline, I think of those women. Under the water everyone can stay together and nobody has to go away, In a devastating ending to the book she opens her eyes during one such fantasy and realises. He returns with gifts and dreams for a future which he berates his country for failing to provide.

When I type the word ‘puppeting’, some invisible clock-hand ticks, some secret key twists, and without noticing, I bleed.

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