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The Force of Destiny: A History of Italy Since 1796 (Hardcover)
Christopher Duggan

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The Bay of Pigs - Pivotal Moments in American History (Hardcover)
Howard Jones

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Books Just In


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Insight Through Intuition: The Pathway To Spriritual Self-Development (Paperback)

Julie Soskin


Book Of The Week

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Apparition & Late Fictions:
A Novella and Stories
By Thomas Lynch

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Opening Hours

Shop

Mon-Wed
9am - 6pm
Fri & Thurs 9am - 8pm
Saturday
9am - 6pm
Sunday
12pm - 6pm

Warehouse

Saturday
10am - 5pm
 


Collection Of Folio Editions



Just In  - A collection of folio editions.
These are beautifully bound classics of literature and history, many in slipcases.


New selection of Classics in our books just in section.



We recently aquired a nice selection of classic book from a private library.  Included are books on Mythology, Literature, Classic Studies and many more. 


New selection of Irish language books just arrived



There is a new selection of  Irish language titles just in to the shop, many which are now out of print.  These can be found in our Irish language section which is at the back of the shop next to Irish History.


Warehouse in Oranmore open on Saturdays

The warehouse in Oranmore is open every Saturday from 10am - 5pm.  For directions to the warehouse, please click here.


Visit Charlie Byrne's in Clarinbridge

Charlie Byrnes have now opened a small shop in Clarinbridge upstairs in  Claire's Tea Room.



Salmon Poetry; Reading It, Writing It, Publishing It

This Saturday, the 24th of October, Charlie Byrne's will host a night of readings from several of Salmon Poetry's best-loved poets. The night is themed Salmon Poetry; Reading It, Writing It, Publishing it, and will feature readings from Jessie Lendennie, Susan Millar DuMars, Kevin Higgins, Joan McBreen, Caroline Lynch, Gerry Hanberry and Celeste Auge. The reading begins at 6pm and the night promises to be an eclectic mix of quality writing.


98 Ways to Find a Great Guy By Elizabeth Hazel Paulson Launch





Join Charlie Byrne's for the Galway launch of NUIG grad Elizabeth Paulson's book, '98 Ways to Find A Great Guy'.  The book will be launched by IMAGE magazine's book editor and freelance journalist Jennifer Ryan on

Tuesday March 16th
at
 6pm.

Refreshments will be severed and all are welcome.


ABOUT THE BOOK
Fed up with spending your Saturday nights cuddled up with a bottle of Pinot Grigio? Tired of donning a hideous bridesmaid’s dress for the zillionth time this year? Pick up a copy of Elizabeth Hazel Paulson’s 98 Ways to Find a Great Guy, and you’re practically guaranteed a date whenever you need one.

Paulson’s tongue-in-cheek list of techniques for finding a date, boyfriend, or soul mate also encourages using your time wisely. Number 14, for example, advises working on a political campaign, where dozens of young, idealistic, and passionate — just like you — men are in adequate supply. And hey, if tip number 17 (shamelessly write down your e-mail address on every restaurant/bar credit card receipt where an attractive man has waited on you) doesn’t work out, there are still 96 more left! You’ll have men throwing themselves at your feet in no time, as you learn how to:

Converse intelligently about his favorite book (chances are, it’s Catch-22 or Trainspotting
Get a date (and some extra cash) by becoming really, really good at either pool or darts, perfecting your most innocent wide-eyed look, and hustling newcomers down at the local pool hall
Go to a car show and brush up on key stats, words, and phrases
Cry on demand or save your tears for the ladies’ room, as the situation calls for
Memorize the holy trinity of guy movies: Terminator 2, The Big Lebowski, and The Usual Suspects
Go to AA and NA meetings where you’ll meet plenty of men willing to admit he’s got a problem
And if all else fails, or “he’s just not that into you,” accuse him of being gay — he’ll be so desperate to prove his heterosexuality that you might just get the upper hand!


Charlie Byrne's Bookshop Launch 'Transforming' Children's Services? By Paul Michael Garrett


Charlie Byrne's are plaesed to announce the launch of 'Transforming' Children's Services? by Paul Michael Garrett, at 6pm, on Friday the 11th of September. The book will be presented by Counicllor Catherine Connolly, and is published by the Open University Press. Paul Michael Garrett is the Director of Social Work, National University of Ireland, Galway and has recieved glowing praise for the book.



Charlie Byrne's Celebrates Culture Night 2009

In Celebration of National Culture Night 2009, on the 25th of September, Charlie Byrne's Bookshop will host a night of culture and readings from many of our local authors. The night offers opportunity to discover and enjoy the rich cultural offering of the country’s cultural venues at night, and this year expands to 11 cities and towns nationwide and features a new look ‘see all sorts’ logo.


 



Fantastic New Children's Books Now In Stock

Many new delightful children’s books have arrived to our shelves in the last few weeks and days. A huge variety of new titles are available including some beautifully illustrated picture books for younger readers from both new authors and award winning favourites Julia Donaldson and Emily Gravett. Our new selection of activity books and novelty books are indispensable during the summer holidays for keeping your children occupied and learning about everything from knights and castles to forensic science, costume history, insects, dolphins, pirates and princesses. For older readers and teenagers we’ve received many themed short story collections, Cynthia Rees and Terry Deary for the in between ages and some really great fantasy titles from Peter Dickinson and romance from Meg Cabot and Kathy Hopkins.

 



Mary Hanlon and Dierdre Kearney launch first collections at Charlie Byrne's Bookshop

Over The Edge and Charlie Byrne's host the launch of two debut poetry collections on Thursday 6th of August at 6.30 p.m. Dearly Beloved by Mary Hanlon and Spiddal Pier by Dierdre Kearney are both published by Belfast's Lapwing Press. The evening will also see the Galway launch of Chora: New & Selected Poems by visiting poet Nigel McLoughlin, which has just been published by Templar Poetry and Transmorphosis & Other Short Stories by Boris Belony (aka Stephen Hughes), which was recently published by Stichy Press. There will also be a short reading by David Starkey, the Poet Laureate of Santa Barbara, California who is visiting Galway.


Charlie Byrne's Welcomes the Galway Races with Horse Themed Window Display



The Galway Races bring excitement and energy to the city each year, with a week of race meetings, fashion and entertainment.In celebration of the festival Charlie Byrne's has put together a beautiful collection of equine titles in the shop's main window. A wide array of horse related books are on display ranging from horse racing and biography to horse health and maintenance books. We also have signed copies of Francis P.M. Hyland's History of the Galway Races.




Book Launch Tonight in Charlie Byrne's



Join us for the launch of Barbelo's Blood, a locally published independent novel, written by Captain Joseph W. Barbelo, and praised by Ken Bruen. The night promises to be both enjoyable and stimulating, with a brief speech from the author, wine and a post-launch reception in Bar 8 on the docks. The launch begins at 6p.m.


Charlie Byrne's welcomes the arrival of the Volvo Ocean Race.

Charlie Byrne’s welcomes the arrival this Saturday May 23rd of the Volvo Ocean Race 2008-2009 Galway stopover.



Billed as the biggest free outdoor event in Ireland this summer, it will be an action-packed activity filled 2 weeks before the Race sets off for its concluding stages on June 6th.

All details of events and arrangements can be found on the Volvo Ocean Race Galway stopover website, www.galwayvolvooceanrace.com.

Charlie Byrne’s opening hours will be extended during the period of the festival as follows:

        Mon-Fri:        9-8 p.m.
        Saturday:       9-6 p.m.
        Sunday:         12-6 p.m.


Bob Dylan and the Poetry of the Blues.

Michael Gray, English writer, critic, broadcaster, musicologist and acknowledged Bob Dylan expert, will give a talk on Dylan on Thursday 28th May at 8 p.m. in the Ruby Room in the King’s Head pub in Galway.



Gray, for many the pre-eminent Dylan biographer, performs a one man show with video and music clips, some rare and unseen. This will be his only West of Ireland appearance – an event not to be missed by Dylan fans.

Gray will be signing copies of his marvellously irreverent ‘The Bob Dylan Encyclopaedia’ as well as copies of his new biography ‘Hand Me My Travelin' Shoes: In Search of Blind Willie McTell’.

We will be selling tickets for the event. €14 / €12 concessions. 


Book Launch on Friday 1 May in Charlie Byrne's!

The Globalisation of God: Celtic Christianity's Nemesis, the new book by Dara Molloy, will be launched on Friday 1 May, at 6.30 p.m., in Charlie Byrne's Bookshop. 
 

 
Molloy’s book is a historical reconstruction of the way Moses’ vision of God influenced the most important world’s religions. It also deals with the conflict between the independent Irish Church and the attempts by the Roman Church to dominate European Christianity from the 4th Century AD.

The book will be launched by Galway TD Michael D Higgins.

Refreshments will be served. Admission is free.


Cúirt International Festival of Literature 2009 coming soon!

"Ah yes", as Hunter Thompson used to say, "and here we go again". It is coming towards the end of April and the Cúirt International Festival of Literature, now in its 24th year, is once more upon us. A little like Christmas and Supplementary Budgets, Cúirt seems to come around faster each year and as ever marks the beginning of the Galway Festival Season that runs for the rest of the year.



Opening on Tuesday 21st April, and running through to Sunday 26th, this year's programme is again packed full of top quality readings and literary events from national and international writers. These authors are the usual eclectic mix of well known and less familiar but equally significant figures that has become a template of the festival and its history.

Highlights include prose reading by Joseph O'Neill, Timothy O'Grady, Nadeem Aslam, Helen Simpson, Claire Keegan and Janice Galloway. Poetry highlights are Jane Hirshfield, Philip Schultz, Thomas Lynch, Carol Ann Duffy, Don Patterson and Sean O'Brien. This year also features an increased number of ancillary events including a season of literary documentaries by Pat Collins, music events, public interviews, lectures, theatre and dance and a series of children's events.

As ever Charlie Byrne's will be the festival bookseller as our mobile unit sets up a de facto bookshop in the foyer of the Town Hall Theatre. For the duration of the festival, the shop will stock titles by all the writers at this year's Cúirt as well as other material of general literary interest. The shop is also the centre of the signing sessions that are held after the individual readings.

Come and join us, and see if once again Cúirt lives up to its billing of the first and best festival of the Galway year.

07/04/09


Lots of new gardening and cookery titles

We recently got in fresh gardening and cookery titles at great prices. The whole section is just been rearranged with a new table.



Our new display also includes lots of other titles - from home decoration to DIYcraft and antiques - at the best prices.


Superb selection of books from a private library.

We just received a superb selection of books from a private library.



Ranging from classics of literature and poetry to history, philosophy, classical studies and art, 1000s of great titles are now available in the shop at unbeatable prices.


New Walker Books titles: a treat for young readers

We now stock a brilliant selection of kids titles from Walker Books from only €3.

Walker Books' recently introduced "Nature story-books" combine animal storybook, factbook and fantastic illustrations to create a beautiful and educational treat for all young animal fans.



Titles include Ape, Tigress, Bat Loves Night and All Pigs Are Beautiful.


Great selection of remainders just in!

In our all new "just in" table we have some 150 titles, both fiction and non-fiction.



This interesting and eclectic selection contains some of the best titles published in the last 2 years at unbeatable prices. We don't expect these books to last long.


Colin Smythe: Gems from the Irish Literary Renaissance

We presently have in stock a broad selection of Colin Smythe titles at great prices.



Long regarded as the most important publisher of material relating to the Irish Literary Renaissance of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, these books are by or about authors such as W. B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, J. M. Synge, George Moore, William Carleton, Denis Johnstone and M. J. Molloy. They also deal with subjects such as the Irish epic myths, the fairy faith, ghosts, folklore and Irish drama and history.

The books are very attractively published with fine illustrations and handsome dust wrappers. We have a limited stock and don't expect them to last long at these prices.


New Pluto Press and Chomsky titles

A great selection of remaindered Pluto Press titles are now available in the shop from only €6. 

Tens of titles from one of the world's leading radical publishers. Subjects include politics, current affairs, international studies, Middle East studies, political theory, media studies, anthropology and development.  

  


Several Noam Chomsky books are also available.


Fr. Ned Crosby Book Launch

Fr. Dick Lyng will launch Fr Ned Crosby's new book of poetry, Windows, on Thursday the 4th of December in Charlie Byrne's starting at 6pm.


                  


Harry Browne's Hammered by the Irish to be launched at Charlie's on Friday November 28th @ 6pm

Author Harry Browne (former Irish Times journalist and DIT lecturer) will be joined by 'Shannon 5' defendant and lifelong activist Ciaron O'Reilly to launch the book that finally tells the story of how five individuals decided to take direct action against an impending war and why, three trials later, an Irish jury decided unanimously to acquit them.





Visions and Revisions



The Directors of Irish Academic Press cordially invite you to a reception to celebrate the launch of three titles in a new literary series:

Visions and Revisions: Irish Writers in their Time Series Editor: Stan Smith

Patrick Kavanagh Edited by Stan Smith
John Banville by John Kenny
Elizabeth Bowen Edited by EibhearWalshe

Guest Speaker
Professor Terence Brown, Trinity College, Dublin
To be held at
The Irish Writers' Centre
19 Parnell Square
Dublin 1
on
Wednesday 26 November 2008
6.00pm-8.30pm

RSVP
Rachel Milotte E: rachel@iap.ie T: +353 (0) 1 668 8244 F: +353 (0) 1 660 1610


Great Range of New Books on Eastern Philosophy and Spirituality




We have just received a very large shipment of new titles from Shambhala publishers. Shambhala are world famous specialists in books on spirituality. Our new shipment includes works on Buddhism, Zen, Taoism, as well as works of fiction and other works on spirituality. We have titles by and about Ken Wilber, Thomas Merton, the Dalai Lama, and Chogyam Trungpa and many many more. And there are multiple copies available of each title.




ACADEMIC BOOKS JUST IN





We have recently received a large number of new academic titles. Included in this shipment are literary criticism texts from Palgrave Macmillan, covering romanticism, Defoe, crime writing, the nature of the novel, poetry, and much more. In addition we have titles in philosophy, archaeology, classics, European history, and politics. Wittgenstein's work is covered by a number of these philosophy books. Below is a drawing that will be, he hoped, thought provoking concerning our ability to see things 'as something.' What do you see it as? And if you begin to see it as something else, why is that, what has happened?
 



Literary Classics

 

We have recently received a shipment of classic titles in English literature. This is just a short list of some of the novels available:

  • Kipling, The Jungle Book
  • Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment, The Idiot
  • Tolstoy, War and Peace
  • Austen, Emma, Sense & Sensibility, Mansfield Park
  • Melville, Moby Dick
  • Cervantes, Don Quixote
  • James, Turn of the Screw

   




Galway Culture Night, Friday 19th September

Galway’s first ever ‘Culture Night’ is to take place on Friday 19th September in a number of locations all over the city . Inspired by the success of the Dublin Culture Night over the past two years, organisers have decided to extend the programme to Cork, Waterford, Limerick and Galway. Galway’s rich cultural fabric along with cultural institutions throughout the city will be showcased by hosting a series of programmes of events and displays on the evening of Friday, 19th September, admission to many which will be completely free.

Charlie Byrne's bookshop hosts the standing army of western writers in Culture Night, inviting to the microphone any and all locally based writers whose fiction, non-fiction, and poetry were transformed into books within the last year. The event is co-ordinated by Michael O'Loughlin, Galway's writer in residence.

Refreshments will be served. Admission is free. From 6.00 pm until some later time!



For more details about other events happening as part of Culture Night, go to: http://galwayculturenight.com/

      
     
           


Man Booker Prize Shortlist


The Man Booker Prize 2008 shortlist is announced today (Tuesday 9 September).  Two first-time novelists, Aravind Adiga and Steve Toltz, survived the cull of the longlist from thirteen novels to just six. Previous winners of the Booker Prize, John Berger and Salman Rushdie,  failed to make this year's shortlist and Sebastian Barry is the only novelist shortlisted for this year's prize to have been previously shortlisted (in 2005). 

Linda Grant, winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction in 2000 and longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2002, is the only female author to make the shortlist of six. She is joined by Philip Hensher, longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2002 and a Booker judge in 2001, and the widely-acclaimed Indian writer Amitav Ghosh. 

The Man Booker Prize 2008 shortlisted novels are:

  • Aravind Adiga The White Tiger  (Atlantic)                             
  • Sebastian Barry The Secret Scripture (Faber and Faber)                        
  • Amitav Ghosh Sea of Poppies (John Murray)                                  
  • Linda Grant The Clothes on their Backs (Virago)             
  • Philip Hensher The Northern Clemency  (Fourth Estate)                    
  • Steve Toltz A Fraction of the Whole  (Hamish Hamilton)

This year's judging panel is chaired by Michael Portillo former MP and Cabinet Minister. He is joined by Alex Clark, editor of Granta; Louise Doughty, novelist; James Heneage, founder of Ottakar's bookshops and Hardeep Singh Kohli, TV and radio broadcaster.


Juliet Bressan book launch



Join us on September 18th at 6pm for the launch of Juliet Bressan's new novel, Snow White Turtle Doves.
 
It is a contemporary love story set to the backdrop of the implications of the Iraq war. It is June 2004, and Ireland is preparing for the visit of George W Bush. Beautiful, tempestuous Isabella is struggling to hold onto Harry, while his passion for world politics pulls him away from her and into the antiwar protest movement. Sinead is a doctor whose experience of Baghdad during the first gulf war has changed her life. Moved by the letters she receives from Moussa, a surgeon in Iraq, Sinead joins the protest against the Bush visit to Shannon. But her campaign against the war quickly turns into a campaign of love for Harry. After a night of passion with Sinead, Harry fails to come home, Isabella makes her final decision and walks out on him, flying straight to New York without even saying goodbye. Will life ever be the same again?



Juliet Bressan studied medicine at Galway University and travelled extensively during her student years, working in America and Australia. She is well known in the medical community as a satirical columnist for the award winning newspaper Medicine Weekly. As a medical journalist Juliet Bressan has contributed widely to Television and Radio broadcasting in Ireland, as well as in France, the UK and the US. She is currently a script advisor to RTE's television series The Clinic. She lives in Dublin and is married with two daughters, Molly and Jessica.


Over the Edge New Writer of the Year Competition

Celeste Augé to judge 2008 Over The Edge New Writer of the Year competition

 
A long list of forty will be announced in Charlie Byrnes' Bookshop at 6pm on Wednesday, August 20th; the shortlist of eight will be announced at the Over The Edge: Open Reading in Galway City Library on Thursday, August 28th; and the winners will announced at the same venue on Thursday, September 25th.
 
 
 
Celeste Augé was born in Canada, but moved to Galway when she was 12 years old. She writes both poetry and fiction. Her poems have appeared in a wide variety of literary journals. She has read her work as part of Poetry Ireland's Introductions and also at the Cúirt Festival/Over The Edge showcase reading in 2006. In 2006 also, she was awarded the Publication Assistance Grant by Galway County Council. Tornadoes For The Weathergirl, a chapbook of her poems, was published in 2007. Her first full collection, The Essential Guide to Flight, is forthcoming from Salmon Poetry.
 


John Healy's The Grass Arena reissued as a Penguin Modern Classic

John Healy first published The Grass Arena in 1988. For a time after that, however, it was out of print. A new paperback version was printed in 2007 when John Healy was asked to attend the Cúirt festival here in Galway. And now, as of August 1st, Penguin are reissuing Healy's brilliant memoir as a Penguin Modern Classic. This is a thoroughly deserved tribute and also a great opportunity for Healy's book to reach a wider audience.
 
We still have a small number of the 2007 paperback edition. And these books are signed by the author.
 
 
 
 
John Healy, the son of poor Irish immigrants in London, grows up hardened by violence and soon finds himself overwhelmed by alcoholism. He ends up in the grass arena: the parks and streets of the inner city, where beggars, thieves, prostitutes and killers fight for survival and each day brings the question of where to find the next drink. In his searing autobiography Healy describes with unflinching honesty his experiences of addiction, his escape through learning to play chess in prison, and his ongoing search for peace of mind.


Booker Long List & Frank O'Connor Short Story Award

The judges for the Frank O'Connor Short Story Award have dispensed with the ritual of issuing a shortlist, announcing that Jhumpa Lahiri has won the world's richest honour for a short story collection. The jurors decided that Unaccustomed Earth was so plainly the best book that they would jump straight from longlist to winner, and have awarded Lahiri the €35,000 prize.
The judges were Granta fiction editor Rosalind Porter, Cork City chief librarian Liam Ronayne and Irish Times Literary correspondent Eileen Battersby.
 

The judges for the 2008 Man Booker Prize for Fiction have announced the longlist for this year's prize:

Aravind Adiga              The White Tiger                                 
Gaynor Arnold             Girl in a Blue Dress                           
Sebastian Barry           The Secret Scripture                         
John Berger                 From A to X                                        
Michelle de Kretser      The Lost Dog                                     
Amitav Ghosh              Sea of Poppies                                  
Linda Grant                 The Clothes on Their Backs             
Mohammed Hanif         A Case of Exploding Mangoes         
Philip Hensher             The Northern Clemency                    
Joseph O'Neill              Netherland                                        
Salman Rushdie          The Enchantress of Florence           
Tom Rob Smith            Child 44                          
Steve Toltz                   A Fraction of the Whole

The judging panel is: Michael Portillo (Chair), former MP and Cabinet Minister, Alex Clark, editor of Granta; Louise Doughty, novelist; James Heneage, founder of Ottakar's bookshops and Hardeep Singh Kohli, TV and radio broadcaster
 
http://www.themanbookerprize.com/
 
 
        


Julian Gough at Charlie's, August 5th, 6pm

Julian Gough (below right) will give a reading in Charlie Byrne’s on Tuesday August 5th at 6pm

Gough was born in London. He grew up in Ireland. He lives in Berlin. And he writes novels.

While studying philosophy at university in Galway, he began singing with the underground, and very literary, rock band Toasted Heretic. They played London, Paris and New York, released four albums, and had a top ten hit in Ireland in 1991 with “ Galway and Los Angeles”, a song about not kissing Sinead O’Connor.

Gough’s first novel, Juno & Juliet was published in 2001. Set in Galway, it stars identical twin sisters in their first year away from home, and is about Life! Love! Literature! His second novel, Jude, stars an orphan with two penises, and is about everything else. It's a rather unusual novel, and is being published in a rather unusual way, starting with Jude: Level 1. Levels 2 and 3 will follow in 2008 and 2009, before all three levels of Jude are published in a handsome hardback some time in the glorious future.
 
 
You can visit Julian's web page here:
 
And you can visit Julian's publishers, Old Street, here:


Charlie Byrne's On Line

 
Opening a Virtual Window on Charlie's
 
Our web page at Charlie Byrne's has been redesigned and reprogrammed. We hope that this web page is easier to use and easier on the eye than its predecessor, but at the same time that it still conveys in some small way the experience of visiting the shop and browsing the shelves.
 
Your views on our new web page would be most welcome as there is always room for improvement with these things.
 
We would like to thank Larry at a-and-d design for all the creative eneregy expended in designing our new look for us. Larry also expended a great deal of creative energy in the first place convincing us that such a revamp was just what we needed. And finally, our thanks also go out to Aidan at Solas Web Design
 
 
www.a-and-d.ie/
 
www.solasweb.com


Cúirt International Festival of Literature 2008

Although we have closed our Festival Bookshop at the Town Hall Theatre for another year, many of the titles on sale during the festival can now be purchased from Charlie Byrne's:
  • Sebastian Barry
  • Rachel Cusk
  • Jennifer Johnston
  • Moya Cannon
  • Samantha Power
  • Asne Seierstad
  • Breyten Breytenbach
  • David Harsent
  • William Henry
  • Seamus Martin
  • Donald Hall
  • Sean Og de Paor
  • and many more ...