{"id":238603,"date":"2026-01-10T23:32:16","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T23:32:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/238603\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T23:32:16","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T23:32:16","slug":"from-a-new-memoir-by-louise-oneill-to-roy-keanes-impact-on-modern-ireland-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/238603\/","title":{"rendered":"From a new memoir by Louise O\u2019Neill to Roy Keane\u2019s impact on modern Ireland \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Irish <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Hungry: A Biography of My Body (Wildfire, April) by Katriona O\u2019Sullivan is the author\u2019s second memoir, her follow-up to the phenomenally successful Poor. She interrogates how trauma, class and gender shape the way women see themselves \u2013 and how society teaches them to measure their value.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Off the Scales (Fourth Estate, January) by Aimee Donnellan, a Reuters reporter based in Galway, is, as its subtitle states, The Inside Story of Ozempic and the Race to Cure Obesity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">This is Also a Love Story (Fourth Estate, May) is Sally Hayden\u2019s follow-up to her multi-award-winning My Fourth Time We Drowned. She re-examines catastrophe through the love stories she has come across, from Ukraine to Nigeria, Syria, Uganda and Iraq, and through them invites us to reconsider what it means to be human today.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Killing Thatcher author Rory Carroll\u2019s new book is A Rebel and a Traitor: A Fugitive, the Manhunt and the Birth of the IRA (Mudlark, March), a biography of Roger Casement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In Outsider (Hachette, February), former Irish Times journalist Paul Cullen is driven to discover his roots as an adoptee after a near-fatal fall from Germany\u2019s highest peak in 2017 left him broken \u2013 physically and emotionally.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Opening Night (Granta, July) by Sara Baume explores the writer\u2019s friendship with artist Mollie Douthit, broadening into an exploration of art and nature.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Interweaving politics, literature, music, and nature, Sensation (PVA, June) by Colin Graham, professor of English at Maynooth University, explores in personal essays his Belfast childhood, how the self is formed and how what we read and see makes us who we are. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Brian Dillon \" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/T7V4LOAZQDMJME7ARZRFZP65N4.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"449\"\/>Brian Dillon  <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ambivalence (Fitzcarraldo, May) by Brian Dillon is a memoir of Dublin in the 1980s and 1990s, and an intimate defence of radical thinking about literature and life.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In An Asylum for My Affections (New Island, February), edited by Molly Hennigan, writers reflect on Maeve Brennan.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">A Hosting: Irish Writers and Writing: 1991-2025 (Lilliput, April) is a collection of more than 50 of my interviews with Irish authors.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Place that Has Never Been Wounded (One, February) is a mindful roadmap to finding your way back to the peace at your core by sensational musician, athlete and campaigner Niall Breslin. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Most Normal Woman (Tramp, August) by Roisin Kiberd (The Disconnect) is about the face we present to the world, and the dark side of our efforts to be beautiful, with essays on blondes, Botox, exercise addiction and the most expensive handbags on earth.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">CTRL: Essays on Video Games (Lilliput, April), edited by Dean Fee, features some of Ireland\u2019s leading writers on the art form.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Celtic World: A History (Four Courts, January) by John Waddell which is a full-colour large format history of the Celts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Wind Beneath the Stone: My Quest to Unearth a Piece of Ireland\u2019s Folklore (Bloomsbury, May) by David Keohan is a journey across Ireland to revive the lost tradition of stone lifting.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Francis Bacon in his studio around 1960. Photograph: Popperfoto\/Getty\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/5T6KVD3DRARGIGJGHOH3RT4E4E.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"787\"\/>Francis Bacon in his studio around 1960. Photograph: Popperfoto\/Getty <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Francis Bacon: a Hidden Irish History (Four Courts, autumn) by Margarita Cappock explores how Bacon\u2019s artistic life can be traced to his upbringing in Ireland. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Irish Soldier (Four Courts, November), edited by Thomas Bartlett, reviews the Irish military experience throughout the world over the past 1,000 years. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Stop Your Shenanigans (New Island, February) by Miche\u00e1l \u00d3 Conghaile celebrates the origins of some of Ireland\u2019s more colourful and interesting words.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In Walking to the Foot of the Sky (Eriu, May) by Miriam Mulcahy (This Is the Sea), a woman in middle age, crushed by the grind of single parenthood, rediscovers her spirit and strength by walking in the wildest places she can find.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Wisdom of Farmers (Allen &amp; Unwin, April) by John Connell (The Cow Book) offers observations from rural life which can be applied to our urban world.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Ice House Murder (Allen &amp; Unwin, April) by Robin Schiller and Pat Marry revisits the vicious murder of Irene White at her home in Dundalk in 2005. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">RT\u00c9: Den of Inequity (Atlantic, April) by Shane Ross offers an inside account of Ireland\u2019s scandal-hit national broadcaster.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Plot Against Ireland (Head of Zeus, September) by Myles Dungan is the story of The Forger, Spies, Tories, Conmen and Terrorists who conspired against Irish Home Rule.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Home Economics (New Island, April) is Caitr\u00edona Lally\u2019s memoir of her time working in the housekeeping department at Trinity College Dublin while she awaits the publication of her first two novels in 2015 and 2021.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Late Heaney (OUP, January) by Nicholas Allen follows Seamus Heaney through the landscapes, friendships and events that shaped his last four collections.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In Banshee: Mythological Irish Women Retold (John Murray, February) edited by Ailbhe Malone, Irish female writers breathe new life into ancient Irish myths, reclaiming the stories of women.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Fiona Donohoe, left, the mother of Noah Donohoe, a 14-year-old who was found dead in a storm drain in north Belfast in June 2020, delivering a petition to PSNI headquarters in Belfast. Photograph: Rebecca Black\/PA\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/ELJZKZILSYGNUM3VAP6Z3QRWUM.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"450\"\/>Fiona Donohoe, left, the mother of Noah Donohoe, a 14-year-old who was found dead in a storm drain in north Belfast in June 2020, delivering a petition to PSNI headquarters in Belfast. Photograph: Rebecca Black\/PA <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Noah Donohoe: The Search for Truth (Mirror Books, May) by Donal MacIntyre is the veteran investigative journalist\u2019s account of the tragic and mysterious death of a 14-year-old Belfast Catholic schoolboy in 2020.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">A Bigger Life (HQ, September) is novelist Louise O\u2019Neill\u2019s post-breakup memoir of sex, heartbreak and questioning received wisdom about happiness.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Exposed: The Scandals that Shook the Irish State (Merrion, September) by Frank Connolly recounts the shocking stories of political, corporate and Garda corruption that shook the State over his career. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Rory O\u2019Connor: To Defend the Republic (Merrion, February) by Gerard Shannon is the first biography of this prominent member of the anti-Treaty IRA. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Veil of Silence: How the Irish State Covered Up an IRA Murder and Framed a Garda Whistleblower (Merrion, March) by JP O\u2019Sullivan discloses how Garda Intelligence ignored warnings that led to the 1985 murder of IRA informer John Corcoran.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">We Need to Talk About Roy: The \u2018Keaneification\u2019 of Modern Ireland (Merrion, March) by Dave Hannigan explores the footballer\u2019s vast impact on Irish sport, culture, and identity. Rory (Simon &amp; Schuster UK, March) by Alan Shipnuck is a biography of golfer Rory McIlroy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Story of Us: Independent Ireland and the 1926 Census (Irish Academic, April) by Orlaith McBride &amp; John Gibney (eds) brings the 1926 census to life through vivid storytelling, expert insight, and stunning visual material.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Neither Confirm Nor Deny: Lawless Agent Running, the Suppression of Truth, and MI5 (Merrion, May) by John Ware charts in forensic detail the murderous activities of two notorious high value state agents, Brian Nelson and Freddie Scappaticci.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Bad Nanny (Merrion, May) by Alan Bradley is the story of Samantha Cookes, a highly skilled scammer working across Ireland for a decade.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Western Washed Genocide (Merrion, June) by Fintan Drury sets out how, despite ongoing atrocities in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/gaza-strip\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/gaza-strip\">Gaza<\/a>, Israel\u2019s support among western powers remained steadfast.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Irish Presidency (Palgrave, May) edited by John Coakley and Kevin Rafter is a revised and updated edition on the politics of the office with new chapters including judging the Higgins presidency and the recent election of Catherine Connolly. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Vincent Browne and Magill (New Island, September) by Kevin Rafter focuses not just on the history of the influential current affairs magazine, told with dozens of interviews with leading media figures, but also revisits the politics and controversies of the 1980s. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Marine Le Pen. Photograph: Thomas Samson\/ AFP via Getty\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/FZA4KYHPNKA3VN5XAR3RXGRXFY.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>Marine Le Pen. Photograph: Thomas Samson\/ AFP via Getty <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Dark Side of France (Apollo, July) by former Irish Times journalist Enda O\u2019Doherty is a gripping exploration of the French far right, from the Dreyfus Affair to Marine Le Pen and the National Rally, whose candidate is strongly placed to seize the leadership of France. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Se\u00e1n Lemass: The Lost Memoir (\u00c9riu, May), edited by Ronan McGreevy, is the political memoir of Ireland\u2019s transformational taoiseach in his own words.<\/p>\n<p>International <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">London Falling (Picador, April) by Patrick Radden Keefe (Say Nothing, Empire of Pain) relates the mysterious death of a London teenager posing as the son of a Russian oligarch \u2013 a family tragedy, a story of greed, power and deception, and an indictment of the culture that has transformed London into a haven for dirty money.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In A Hymn to Life (Bodley Head, February), Gis\u00e8le Pelicot\u2019s aim is to nurture \u201cstrength and courage\u201d in other survivors. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Light and Thread (Hamish Hamilton, March) by Nobel Prize winner Han Kang, translated by Maya West, e yaewon, and Paige Aniyah Morris, traces the connections between her interior and exterior worlds through essays, poems, photographs and diaries.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Nation of Strangers (Canongate, February) by Turkish political thinker Ece Temelkuran promises a powerful reappraisal of the concept of exile, migration and home. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Rana Dasgupta\u2019s After Nations: The Making and Unmaking of a World Order (William Collins, February) traces the formation and rise of the nation-state system to explain its multiple failures today.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein (Hamish Hamilton, April) by Deborah Levy explores the life of the avant-garde American poet, art collector, godmother of modernism and queer icon in a genre-bending fashion.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Great Good Places (Canongate, April) by Margaret Drabble explores age and memory through previously uncollected short stories, meoir and essays. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Michael Gambon. Photograph: Collins Photo Agency\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/OATAXKTA2OULK355577N3Z3Y54.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"533\"\/>Michael Gambon. Photograph: Collins Photo Agency <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Michael Gambon: The Authorised Biography (Century, October) by Jasper Rees is a portrait of the Irish actor, who died in 2023. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Baldwin: A Love Story (Bloomsbury, March) by Nicholas Boggs, the first big biography of the great black American in three decades, reveals how profoundly the writer\u2019s personal relationships shaped his life and work.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">More (Bloomsbury, September) by Gillian Anderson, follow-up to her bestseller Want, presenting a new collection of letters that reveal the unfiltered desires and sexual fantasies of anonymous women across the globe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ghost Stories (Sceptre, May) by Siri Hustvedt, a memoir of her final years with husband Paul Auster, who died of cancer in 2024. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Steps (Seven Dials, May) is Sylvester Stallone\u2019s first autobiography.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Alan Bennett\u2019s diaries Enough Said (Faber, March) span the period 2016-2024, taking in such momentous events as Brexit and the death of the Queen.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Melvyn Bragg\u2019s Another World (Sceptre, February), revisits his time at the University of Oxford in the late 1950s. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Naomi Klein teams up with documentary maker Astra Taylor to describe End Times Fascism (Allen Lane, September).<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" data-chromatic=\"ignore\" alt=\"Stephen Graham. Photograph: Gareth Cattermole\/Getty for BFI\" class=\"c-image\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/CS53C3DMUGYRBUE4YEYAWHAZLI.jpg\"   width=\"800\" height=\"540\"\/>Stephen Graham. Photograph: Gareth Cattermole\/Getty for BFI <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Stephen Graham has teamed up with psychologist Orly Klein to compile Letters to Our Sons (Bloomsbury, October), a collection of fathers\u2019 reflections on \u201cwhat it means to be a man\u201d, including one from the actor himself. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In The Castle (Viking, August), Jon Ronson tries to discover what led his son Joel to attend a mysterious event at a multimillionaire\u2019s mansion in New England, in the process uncovering \u201ca world of unmoored men on a desperate search for purpose\u201d. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Kids, Wait Till You Hear This! (Coronet, March) is Liza Minnelli\u2019s memoir as told to her friend and singer Michael Feinstein.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Talking Heads frontman David Byrne\u2019s Sleeping Beauties (Canongate, October) explores works of art or inventions that are ignored at the time but resurface after years of dormancy \u2013 from Bruegel to antiseptics. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In Tonight the Music Seems So Loud (Picador, June), journalist Sathnam Sanghera examines the career and influence of George Michael 10 years after the singer songwriter\u2019s death at the age of 53. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Auden (Reaktion, March) by Peter Ackroyd explores the evolution of his poetic voice in tandem with his shifting beliefs \u2013 existentialism, Marxism, Freudianism and Anglo-Catholicism.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The New Dark Ages: The End of Reading and the Dawn of a Post-Literate Society (Bodley Head, May) is an impassioned attack on the culture of the screen and a defence of the written word, from the Times columnist and critic James Marriott.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ukrainian Lessons: Art in a Time of War (Jonathan Cape, August) by the Guardian\u2019s chief culture writer Charlotte Higgins tells of the resilience and perseverance of artists and civilians in Ukraine fighting to preserve their culture as well as their land.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In Leaving Home: A Memoir in Full Colour (Chatto &amp; Windus, February), Mark Haddon turns to his own life for material, growing up in the cultural wastelands of the English Midlands in the 1960s and 1970s.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Irish Hungry: A Biography of My Body (Wildfire, April) by Katriona O\u2019Sullivan is the author\u2019s second memoir, her&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":238604,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[3656,5252,93,3724,121031,40326,44607,121033,61,60,3411,7731,75263,121030,9147,121036,121034,121035,73016,75254,121028,1394,271,6085,121029,42017,35790,106203,10834,6883,9688,121032],"class_list":{"0":"post-238603","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-catherine-connolly","9":"tag-david-byrne","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-francis-bacon","12":"tag-freddie-scappaticci","13":"tag-george-michael","14":"tag-gillian-anderson","15":"tag-gisele-pelicot","16":"tag-ie","17":"tag-ireland","18":"tag-israel-hamas-conflict","19":"tag-listicles","20":"tag-liza-minnelli","21":"tag-louise-o-neill","22":"tag-marine-le-pen","23":"tag-mark-haddon","24":"tag-michael-gambon","25":"tag-naomi-klein","26":"tag-niall-breslin","27":"tag-patrick-radden-keefe","28":"tag-roger-casement","29":"tag-rory-mcilroy","30":"tag-roy-keane","31":"tag-rte","32":"tag-sara-baume","33":"tag-seamus-heaney","34":"tag-sean-lemass","35":"tag-shane-ross","36":"tag-stephen-graham","37":"tag-sylvester-stallone","38":"tag-ukraine-crisis","39":"tag-vincent-browne"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=238603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/238604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=238603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=238603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=238603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}