KEITH’S ‘BLUE STAR RISING’ IS ON THE BEST SELLER LIST
‘BLUE STAR RISING’, the debut novel by a former Wicklow county footballer and secondary school principal, has hit number three in the bestselling Charts in Dubray Bray – with only two children’s books by the world-famous David Walliams ahead.
Keith Ryan, a Bray native now living in Wicklow town, played Gaelic Football for Wicklow in the 1970s and
1980s, winning Nation League Division 2, 3, and 4 medals in an unprecedented period of success for the Garden County.
He was a key member of the 1974 Minor Football Team that has the distinction of being the first and only Wicklow team to win the Leinster Football Championship. Wicklow beat a Longford side powered by St Mel’s, who were All-Ireland Colleges Champions that year, in the provincial decider in Croke Park. Longford had beaten Dublin in the semi-final while Wicklow had conquered Laois and Meath to reach the decider. Wicklow demolished Longford that day winning by 5- 6 to 1-9. It was the curtain-raiser to the Kevin Heffernan’s Dublin team that went on to win the All-Ireland in what proved to be the dawn of a golden era for the Dubs. Keith later marked the late Synge Street’s Anton O’Toole, the Blue Panther, in the Leinster Championship, when Dublin narrowly shaded it in that famous clash in Newbridge in 1981.
Keith Ryan worked as a teacher in St Brendan’s College, Woodbrook, from 1979 before taking the reins as principal of Synge Street CBS in 2002. He was chairperson of the Dublin Inner City Network of Post-Primary schools, a body representing the interests of all but one of the schools in Dublin Inner City.
Mr Ryan was appointed to the position of Principal of Oatlands College in 2005 and remained there until his retirement in 2013. Under his leadership, the college embarked on an ambitious re-development of its facilities including a new technology wing and a state-ofthe-art sports centre. It is an academic Centre of Excellence where music, drama, and sport continue to flourish under the present Principal Caroline Garrett and her team.
Since retiring in 2013, Keith Ryan has devoted his time to writing, singing and family. He is Chairperson of the Voices of Bray Community Choir, who performed their Christmas Concert in St Fergal’s Church Bray recently.
His passion for sport and his experiences in education have inspired his first book, ‘Blue Star Rising’. It is a literary novel set in the autumn of 1993, and tells the story of Richard (Dickie) Boyle, a member of the Dublin Gaelic Football Team who face Kerry in the All-Ireland Final. As a child, Richard was fostered from his birth family in the inner city to a middle class family in the suburbs.
He starts a temporary teaching job in a sheltered workshop where he meets Dee. This tale of young love is set against a background of life threatening violence, social imbalance, and family opposition. The journey of self-discovery takes Dickie back to his birth family in Dublin’s flatland, and their involvement with drugs and paramilitary violence, forcing him to confront his past – a past that threatens to destroy all that he holds dear.
Since pre-release last week it has been the top best-seller non-children’s book in Dubray Bray. It is published by Camaderry Press, an Independent Company.
Blue Star Rising is available in Bridge Street Books in Wicklow town, Dubray Books in Bray and Stillorgan, and Reads in Stillorgan and online at readsdirect.ie, and Village Books, Greystones. It is available to order on Amazon. co.uk and Amazon.com both as a paperback and as an e-book. It is also available to download in Kindle, Apple, and in all good online stores such as Kobo, Barnes and Noble, etc.