Topographia Hibernica

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What to expect

The new short-story collection from Irish bestselling author, musician and comedian Blindboy Boatclub.

You don't fully appreciate how large a donkey's head is until it's beside you in a Fiat Punto. The view in my mirror was furry and violent. I was driving blind.

Driving with a donkey stuffed in the back seat; jackdaws pecking brains out through the roof of a confessional box; cat piss and astronauts. This is the world not as you see it, but as it is, twisted from the maverick mind of Blindboy Boatclub.

These are stories of the strange unsettlings in the souls of men caught in between the past and the possible; stories of heart-blinding rage and disquieting compassion.

Taking its title from a twelfth-century English manuscript of the same name, which dehumanised the people and culture of Ireland to facilitate domination, Topographia Hibernica is a collection that unravels the knotted threads of humanity, nature and colonisation from a contemporary Irish perspective.

Called 'one of the most gifted writers of his generation' by the Irish Times, Blindboy Boatclub is the essential voice for the Irish condition in the twenty-first century. Topographia Hibernica is his unmissable new short-story collection.

(P)2023 Hodder & Stoughton Limited

Critics Review

Powered by immense, perverse energy out of the Limerick idiom, the collection generates a singular music that is memorable, unsettling and humane. Moments of beauty dazzle amid the profanity, as pathos and comedy are braided together
Guardian
Eerie, dark and twisted . . . Blindboy's passion for Irish nature, mythology and folklore lends a spiritual profundity
Buzz
One of the most gifted writers of his generation
Michael Harding - Irish Times
A bestseller in the bag
Irish Independent
A cultural phenomenon...

Earnest and intellectual, but also funny and down-to-earth....

Talking to him can feel like skittering around a galaxy of Wikipedia wormholes (in a good way)
New York Times
One of the best books I have ever read
Johnny Marr

User Reviews

Book 4.7
Narration 4.3
4.0
3.0
Interesting and at times challenging. Great observation and description of the natural world. A bit Po serous in its narration. I sped it up. Not sure about the use of background music.
StanRo 01/09/2025
5.0
5.0
A great collection of stories. Sad,, heart warming, surreal, historical, shocking and funny
Burty 29/08/2025
5.0
5.0
eddieq 22/12/2024

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