THE BEST PAPERBACKS

NON-FICTION

Dadland Keggie Carew Vintage €10.99 In this quite riveting book, Keggie Carew tells the story of her extraordinary father Tom, a thoroughly engaging and eccentric individual who just happened to have been a war hero famed for his guerrilla exploits in Burma. Tom was losing his mind to dementia when his daughter started to record his life, but the power of his personality illuminates every page.

NON-FICTION

The Vanishing Man Laura Cumming Vintage €26.59 Art critic Laura Cumming believes Velázquez is the greatest of all artists, and she was inspired to embark on this superb exploration of his life and work after seeing his Las Meninas in Madrid. She also tells the remarkable story of an obscure Victorian collector whose life was tragically ruined by the discovery of a lost Velázquez portrait.

FICTION

My Own Dear Brother Holly Müller Bloomsbury €12.60 Ursula, the heroine of this gripping debut novel, is a teenager growing up in Austria at the end of World War II. The battle is lost and the Russians are coming, but even in the remote countryside the ideologues of the Nazi state are hard at work, not least on Ursula’s older brother. When a neighbour is victimised, Ursula embarks on a dangerous quest.

NON-FICTION

When Breath Becomes Air Paul Kalanithi Vintage €10.99 Paul Kalanithi was a brilliant young doctor who, on the verge of completing his training to be a neurosurgeon, was diagnosed with inoperable cancer. The record he kept of his final months is at times unbearably poignant, but never maudlin. Kalanithi possessed a rare combination of scientific rigour and literary sensitivity, and his prose is remarkable for its clarity.