Library

Browse and search novels

3 novels found

Temporary Gentleman

Temporary Gentleman

General Fiction

(ireland) Sebastian Barry

116K0

"The Temporary Gentleman" is a novel written by Sebastian Barry in 2016. It is also the last book in the "Sebastian Pentology". This is Barry's third novel about the McNulty family. The hero of the story, Jack, is the brother-in-law of Roseanne, the heroine of "The Secret Manuscript", and the brother of Enes, the protagonist of the novel "THEWHEREABOUTSOFENNIUSMCNULTY" (not published in mainland China). Jack is the only character in the Five Parts who appears in a negative light. He was an alcoholic, a gambler, an absentee father, and a neglected husband. He is dissolute and lazy, lacks responsibility for marriage and family, and is confused and indifferent in the face of war and the army. Almost everything he does has a beginning and an end, and he is used to wasting away his time in a muddle-headed manner, until 1957, which is the time when the novel begins. At that time, World War II had ended many years ago, his wife Man had passed away, and his children had grown up. Jack lived alone in Accra, Ghana, recording the past years in words amid aging, loneliness, hesitation and regret. What tormented Jack was not the sadness of his dying years, nor the disease, nor the cruel memories of the war, but his grief for his wife, a "gnashing guilt" that kept eating away at his soul. The title of the novel seems to be a satire on Jack's absurd life, a temporary gentleman for whom virtue seems to be forever fleeting.

On the Other Side of Canaan

(ireland) Sebastian Barry

148K0

"Beyond Canaan" is a novel by contemporary Irish writer Sebastian Barry. This work won the 2012 Walter Scott Literary Award and was nominated for the 2011 Booker Prize. The protagonist of the story, eighty-nine-year-old Lily Brie, decided to end her life in a "quiet way". She spent her whole life running and avoiding, but fate always strangled her neck in the most unexpected way, taking away her loved ones, destroying their bodies, tearing apart their souls, leaving no one behind. The scarred generations of Irish people are silently accountable to history, burdened with painful ethical paradoxes.

Top Secret Manuscript

Top Secret Manuscript

General Fiction

(ireland) Sebastian Barry

168K0

"Top Secret Manuscript" is a novel by contemporary Irish writer Sebastian Barry. It won the "James Tait Black Memorial Award", the oldest literary award in the UK, and also won the "Best Novel of the Year Award" at the "Costa Literary Award" in 2008. In addition, the work won Novel of the Year at the Irish Book Awards and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize. "Top Secret Manuscript" tells the legendary life of the heroine Roxanne during the Irish War of Independence. At the beginning of the story, the elderly Roxanne, who has been a patient in the Roscommon Regional Mental Hospital for more than 50 years, decided to complete an autobiography during her last journey to record the life of her and her parents in Sligo in the early 20th century. She hid her story under the loose floorboards, not wanting the secret to be discovered for the time being. The second narrative thread of the story revolves around Dr. Green, the hospital's current chief psychiatrist.