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Of Ireland, and the importance of stories
Fittingly for the first day of summer – and a scorcher – here’s a warm welcome to Tom Dillon, whose first contribution to Briar Patch Books is posted here. Tom is a veteran journalist and all-around good guy. By Tom Dillon THE LAST STORYTELLER: A NOVEL OF IRELAND. By Frank Delaney. Random House. 385 pages.…
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Good read, good ending
Paul O’Connor and I were working together on the Winston-Salem Journal’s editorial pages at the time of the Sept. 11 attacks. Paul has read a lot about the circumstances that led up to the attacks and the findings of the 9/11 Commission. I was interested to read his review of this book about how, 10…
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Spies, air raids, Churchill – and a young lady who can handle them all
I like fiction that deals with fairly recent history and sometimes includes real people. Maybe that’s because most of the history courses I had in school stopped at about the beginning of the 20th century, so fiction grounded in fact helps to fill in the gaps. Maybe it’s because the links between what happened in…
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Doing one’s best in Botswana
Aficionados of fine wine and food speak of cleansing the palate so that their tastes will be fresh and clear, enabling them to fully appreciate whatever it is they are going to experience next. I find myself thinking of reading the latest novel in Alexander McCall Smith’s No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series as a…