Media Reviews

The Spectator (UK) The traditional epithet for a good first novel is 'promising'. The Spinning Heart, however, is far more than that. Instead, it's the unambiguous announcement of a genuine and apparently fully-formed new talent.

The Financial Times (UK) A funny, moving, technically inventive first novel.... Structurally the novel gestures to William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying, while Ryan's sensitive observations on Irish life seem responsive to the work of his compatriot Patrick McCabe. That Ryan does not look out of place in such literary company is a measure of his achievement

The Sunday Independent (UK) A new Irish writer of the very first order. Donal Ryan is the real deal.

Publishers Weekly Even as some of the voices seem extraneous, added for color but little else, Ryan has created a faithful portrait of a time and place in his debut novel, but his truest accomplishment lies in the fact that, though the individual accounts add up to a greater whole, each story stands on its own.

Booklist Although the subject matter is overwhelmingly bleak, the prose is lyrical, and the voices are authentic. Flashes of humor and tenderness shine through as well, as the helplessness and frustration of an era is effectively captured through the lives of these small-town residents.

Library Journal Starred Review. Altogether 21 different characters narrate 21 chapters to relate Bobby Mahon's fall from grace, with Ryan showing himself to be a virtuoso stylist as he credibly conveys the viewpoints of men and women of all ages in language distinct from one section to the next.

Kirkus Reviews Starred Review. Disturbing and unnerving but ultimately beautiful.

The Irish Times For all the harshness of language and the often brutal experiences, The Spinning Heart is unexpectedly tender... An exciting contemporary novel about the lost and the wounded that listens to the present without discarding either the sins of the fathers or the literary legacy of the past.

 John Boland A first novel that's up-to-date in its concerns but that also transcends the merely topical in its bleak, if often savagely funny, vision of a rural Ireland. Donal Ryan has an imaginative insight into his characters that's all his own and a furious energy to his prose that gives arrestingly vivid life to these blighted souls.

 Declan Hughes Ryan's feat is considerable...Given a novel as brilliantly realized as The Spinning Heart, I see no reason to look anywhere but the present. For Donal Ryan, the future is now.

 Natascha McElhone I have ordered a copy of The Spinning Heart for everyone I know who loves to read. What a treasure of a book.

 John Boyne I can't imagine a more original, more perceptive or more passionate work than this. Outstanding.

Reader Reviews

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