LITERARY FICTION

The Heart’s Invisible Furies John Boyne Transworld, €19.60

Boyne’s tenth novel tracks the progress of gay rights in Ireland from the 1940s to 2015. It blazes with anger at the brutally repressive Church which obliged gay men to suppress their true identity and live in crippling shame. Hero Cyril Avery is born in 1945, doubly stigmatised through his illegitimacy and sexuality. Cyril finds happiness abroad but comes home to stake his claim...

Midwinter Break Bernard MacLaverty Jonathan Cape €16.99

Under cover of an elderly married couple’s mini-break to Amsterdam, MacLaverty explores the tightening vice of alcoholism in his first novel for 16 years. His tender evocation of old age also charts its existential challenges from the meaning of life to the importance of love, faith, companionship and work.

House Of Names By Colm Tóibín Viking €18.20

A change from the elegant and restrained storytelling of Brooklyn and Nora Webster, this is a dramatic retelling of the tragedy of the house of Atreus. Tóibín humanises the protagonists of Greek legend from Agamemnon to Clytemnestra his wife, their son Orestes and daughters Iphigenia and Electra. It’s an ambitious work, perhaps too much so but its daring exploration of the visceral ravages of revenge and distrust is impressive.

Manhattan Beach Jennifer Egan Corsair €18.99

The Ziegfeld follies, the criminal underworld of Thirties New York City, WWII maritime missions – all are brought to life with irresistible intensity as heroine Anna Kerrigan toys with a suave gangster and pursues twin goals: becoming a deep-sea diver and solving the mystery of her missing father.

Acts Of Allegiance Peter Cunningham Sandstone Press €14.99

Author Cunningham discovered as an adult that his father had been a spy providing info on the IRA back in 1940s, so there is a true story at the heart of this beautifully written thriller that spans Ireland of the 1950s to the Eighties.