City of Bohane

Apr 17, 2012 karen rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: girls-gone-wild, distant-lands

i do not know if you will like this book.

usually, i am pretty good with the readers' advisory thing - i have this innate sense that automatically provides me with a list of names of people i think would appreciate the book, even if i didn't like it myself. call it a gift.

but this one - i am genuinely at a loss. i know that i liked it, but i also know that i am a little bit damaged from having read it. like my brain has been mooshed a little and i have had a hard time readjusting.

so it takes pla...more

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Dec 29, 2012 Bennet rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Bennet by: Vheissu

Shelves: novels-stories

The language dazzled and taunted and tempted till the end, but I can't call the story or the ending satisfying. For all the detailing, much was not developed that could have been, and without a lot more effort, which, it seems to me, would have made this a better story.

It's a new book, just out this year, but I don't feel like explaining what it's about and will just insert the book blurb for those who are curious but don't want to refer back to it: Thirty or so years in the future. The once-gre...more The language dazzled and taunted and tempted till the end, but I can't call the story or the ending satisfying. For all the detailing, much was not developed that could have been, and without a lot more effort, which, it seems to me, would have made this a better story.

It's a new book, just out this year, but I don't feel like explaining what it's about and will just insert the book blurb for those who are curious but don't want to refer back to it: Thirty or so years in the future. The once-great city of Bohane on the west coast of Ireland is on its knees, infested by vice and split along tribal lines. There are the posh parts of town, but it is in the slums and backstreets of Smoketown, the tower blocks of the North Rises and the eerie bogs of the Big Nothin' that the city really lives. For years it has all been under the control of Logan Hartnett, the dapper godfather of the Hartnett Fancy gang. But they say his old rival Gant Broderick is back; there is dissent within the Fancy ranks; there are problems with the missus... and then there's his mother.

I'd call it speculative noir, and as language goes you can't beat it. But a couple of central characters never became more than props and had great potential to be more interesting. The big boss's wife, Macu, for example. There was much conspiring to manipulate her but that thread was never sufficiently played out. Much that was key to the central conflict seemed slighted, mostly, it seemed to me, because there were too many "extras" -- characters who amounted to clutter.

Also -- (view spoiler)

I get the riotous and messy and fantastic nature of things -- and the language suited that brilliantly, so much so that I can't give less than 4 stars -- but the story was ultimately too disjointed to merit 5 stars.(less)

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May 31, 2011 Linda Anne Smith rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is a book that you will either love or hate. I did both!!!
I read the first 2 chapters and really struggled with them, both in terms of the language (very broad Irish dialect and patois) and also just trying to find something - character or story - to start building the reading experience from. To be honest, if it wasn't for the fact that i "had to" read it for Book Club, I would not have persevered with this book. So I started again, and re-read the beginning, and kept going second-time ar...more This is a book that you will either love or hate. I did both!!!
I read the first 2 chapters and really struggled with them, both in terms of the language (very broad Irish dialect and patois) and also just trying to find something - character or story - to start building the reading experience from. To be honest, if it wasn't for the fact that i "had to" read it for Book Club, I would not have persevered with this book. So I started again, and re-read the beginning, and kept going second-time around. However by the time i got about a third of the way through, I realised that the book had hooked me in - at teatime I was just dying for bedtime to get out my book and find out what happened next!!! There was not a specific incident - the book/ plot/ characters just sort of slowly grew in my subconscious, and nobody could have been more surprised by this than me!!!
It tells of the struggle for power in a small irish town in the year 2054, and the setting is intensely dark, almost to the point of grotesque, although there is no explanation as to how this civilisation got to this point. There is no technology (phones, laptops, tvs etc) and no government - local or national. There is however a lot of gang warfare.
Some people have commented on the lack of storyline. However, I did think there was quite an intricate plot going on between all of the main - and some of the secondary - characters. But in many cases, the author was (quite deliberately i think) not giving the whole game away, but leaving the reader to dot the i's and cross the t's of what was going on. And in some cases he - the author - just left you wondering "why", "what", "how"????? At first, this annoyed me, all these unanswered questions, but then I got to thinking maybe its not such a bad thing, leaving space for the readers' imagination to fill in the gaps e.g. why was there no technology, phones, pcs etc.?? And so when I came to the end, rather than being disappointed, my feelings were more of "ooh, I wonder why" or even "I wonder if"....
I did think that there was a bit too much gratuitous sex and violence for my liking, but hey, I know that i'm a bit of a softie re these things!!!
Would I recommend it to all my friends - definitely not - but perhaps i would suggest it to one or two, although i'd warn them that it is perhaps a bit of a risky read......(less)

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Mar 18, 2013 Ali rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites

Unusual and memorable bog-soaked poetry of a small Irish city filled with whores, gamblers, criminals, lonely hearts, and every other kind of down-and-outer. It's a city where whoever schemes the best lives the longest, and you can't trust anyone. It's a city that breaks people.

Like drinking whiskey on a wintery day in a room with no heat, no light, and two-inch gapes between each wooden wall plank, Barry's book will shake you. It's a silent, desperate bellowing yellow to the moon. And it's also...more

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Mar 09, 2013 Ian Young rated it 5 of 5 stars

“Tricky the paths a long love might follow, like the spiral down twists of a raindrop on a windowpane.” Kevin Barry's first novel is underpinned by the story of such a love, but distinguished by its swagger and vitality.

The City of Bohane is somewhere in the West of Ireland in the distant future, an Ireland that is real yet warped and seen through a dirty and distorted lens. The language of the book reflects the vision of the City – it too is bent and twisted, mixed with partly real, partly imag...more “Tricky the paths a long love might follow, like the spiral down twists of a raindrop on a windowpane.” Kevin Barry's first novel is underpinned by the story of such a love, but distinguished by its swagger and vitality.

The City of Bohane is somewhere in the West of Ireland in the distant future, an Ireland that is real yet warped and seen through a dirty and distorted lens. The language of the book reflects the vision of the City – it too is bent and twisted, mixed with partly real, partly imagined dialect. Bohane is full of passionate life and vicious, sudden death, seedy glamour and sudden violence. In Bohane emotions are strong, as are colours, smells and squalor. The people of Bohane are proud, of their heritage and fashion and place in the world. They are outsiders, yet see themselves as its centre. Stretching into the distance are the Boglands, emptying their waters and people into the cesspit of the city. There is no advance technology here. It is unclear what has happened in the world, but there has been a regression to a more primitive way of life.

Kevin Barry has written an unusual and original novel which will not be easily forgotten by anyone who reads it. Logan Hartnett, the Long Fella, is its central character, an albino who runs the Hartnett Fancy which in turn controls the underside of Bohane – and in Bohane, the underside is what matters. He is known for his style and his ruthlessness, but also for his jealous devotion to one woman, Macu, who has been by his side for thirty years. In Bohane terms Logan is an old man, and young rivals are beginning to circle – Wolfie Stanners and Fucker Burke, inseparable since their shooldays, and Jenny Ching, the girl who is coming between them and has ambitions of her own. Into this mix comes The Gant, Logan’s chief rival for the affections of Macu from years gone by. The Hartnett Fancy will have to fight for their position as the families from the tenements on the hill become restless, and the Sand Pikeys from the Dunes encroach from the rear and Logan will have to work hard to retain his position and his woman. Overseeing it all, his ancient mother Girly Hartnett plots and schemes from her attic bedroom.

The City of Bohane contains many stories. Love, ambition and violence are central. The writing is striking and at times clearly cinematic – inventive and playful language, striking word pictures, close ups and tracking shots. There are recurring motifs, such as descriptions of the clothes of the central characters. Above all there is extraordinary vitality and exuberance, laughter and tragedy. The men are larger than life, the women seductive and deceptive and ultimately in charge. There is more than a hint of Gypsy Wedding but this is a well crafted and memorable piece of writing that should appeal to anyone who loves a dystopian view of the world. Kevin Barry is a very talented Irish writer – his two volumes of short stories are markedly different to this novel and show the breadth of his vision. If you haven’t discovered him, now is a good time to start.
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Oct 06, 2011 Casey rated it 5 of 5 stars

I love this book so far. The language in both the dialogue and the narration is fantastic. It just pops.
And there's a lot of really meaty subject matter going on- Revenge, love, growing old, legacies... Awesome.

Also, I promise that my endorsement of this book is not affected by the fact that Graywolf is publishing the US edition in March 2012. Honest. This book is straight legit. I am, however, super excited that we're going to be publishing the US edition in March 2012.

***Update***

The end of th...more

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Jul 13, 2012 Joe rated it 4 of 5 stars

The NY Times review was laudatory for this debut novel praising it for its originality and beauty of language. After reading it, I could not agree more. Kevin Barry belongs in a top row of authors who use the language as if it were an instrument. The shimmering prose dances across the page in rhythmic pirouettes brightening everything it touches. Imagine Mad Max with its strange characters and unique dress in a futuristic time in a ravaged, deranged city in Ireland.
I've often thought of people l...more

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Jun 14, 2013 Susan Malone rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is one of those books that I wanted to just rave about. And about much of it, I can. The prose is luscious, even with the difficult-to-read dialect. The characters, truly well drawn and differentiated. And I'm such a fan of what Graywolf Press puts out, relishing that a small press still exists to publish great literature (which they do).

This novel is set in a time forty years in the future, and that future does indeed look bleak. Although it's the people who play the biggest part in that...more

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Jan 25, 2013 Dan Schaeffer rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The title city, Bohane, sits somewhere in the West of Ireland, sometime about 40 years in our future, surrounded by the Big Nothin' and steeped in an atmosphere of bleakness, isolation, and nostalgia for the "lost time." Though the city has an upscale district, Beauvista, the heart of the story resides in the tenements of the Back Traces, the concrete towers of the Northside Rises, and the whorehouses and opium dens of Smoketown. These places provide the backdrop for gang violence, power struggl...more

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Nov 14, 2012 Vivian Valvano rated it 4 of 5 stars

Barry, who has already made a name for himself via his short stories, has written a smashing first novel. It's placed in the future, around 2050s, in the fictional city of Bohane (pronounced with second syllable rhyming with "on" - I heard Barry read from the novel in Montreal), on the west coast of Ireland. Alas, some measures of apocalypse have lain waste to the once great place. Most of the city is now composed of slums, and there is Smoketown, the decrepit tower blocks known as the North Ris...more Barry, who has already made a name for himself via his short stories, has written a smashing first novel. It's placed in the future, around 2050s, in the fictional city of Bohane (pronounced with second syllable rhyming with "on" - I heard Barry read from the novel in Montreal), on the west coast of Ireland. Alas, some measures of apocalypse have lain waste to the once great place. Most of the city is now composed of slums, and there is Smoketown, the decrepit tower blocks known as the North Rises, and a haunting wasteland called the Big Nothin', which is what remains of the old bogs. Gangs prevail. Crime is rife. Life, for the vast majority, is rough and tumble. Control, for a long time, has been held by Logan Hartnett, aka the Albino, leader of the Hartnett Fancy gang. The plot, such as it is (plot is not the novel's focus), centers on the reappearance of Logan's rival Gant Broderick. Will there be a gang rumble, and can Logan forestall the dissent in his own gang? The power of the novel lies, I think, in the effect of Barry's language. It demands to be read aloud; it demands that the reader be a listener, too, to appreciate the rhythms of the vocabulary, descriptions,dialogue. Even when the atmosphere is violent, the language is lyrical. Some of the characters are just so original that they beggar attempts at description (see Logan's wife - realism is not the primary aim of Barry's characterizations). I loved the way Barry infused phrases and sentences and names and titles that one suddenly realizes are references to Ireland's past, her history ... long gone. This is not a gimmicky tome; Barry knows his history full well. Don't expect visions of sugarplums, but if you know Irish history, visions of Dublin and Belfast, rivers and cairns, some of Ireland's heroes and villains (depending upon your perspective), and much more, should dance in your head. The novel is not for everyone, but I think it's a unique accomplishment from a writer with a unique talent.(less)

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Jul 29, 2012 T.R. rated it 5 of 5 stars

As a high school teacher, I'm taking a summer class on on teaching reading and we reviewed a list of the 'pleasures of reading.' And the first two had to do with the pleasure associated with knowing the correspondences between letters and sounds and the pleasure of the sounds themselves as you read aloud. Barry's novel, for all it's atmosphere and impact in the literary circles, reminds me of those first two pleasures. Barry is mostly known as a short story writer, and it shows. On each page the...more As a high school teacher, I'm taking a summer class on on teaching reading and we reviewed a list of the 'pleasures of reading.' And the first two had to do with the pleasure associated with knowing the correspondences between letters and sounds and the pleasure of the sounds themselves as you read aloud. Barry's novel, for all it's atmosphere and impact in the literary circles, reminds me of those first two pleasures. Barry is mostly known as a short story writer, and it shows. On each page the slang, the syntax, the imagery are stunning. Within the first two pages: "There was an evenness to his footfall, a slow calm rhythm of leather on stone... Mouth of teeth on him like a vandalised graveyard but we all have our crosses. It was a pair of hand-stitched Portuguese boots that slap his footfall, and the stress that fell, the emphasis, was money." Listen to this dialogue as two folks in the Hartnett Fancy gang talk about some possible trouble: "Cusacks gonna sulk up a welt o' vengeance by 'n' by and if yer askin' me, like? A rake o' them tossers bullin' down off the Rises is the las' thing Smoketown need." I'll stop writing already. Go read the book.

OK, I do want to say something else. The Irish don't have sole proprietorship on nostalgia. Talk to any local in my neighborhood and within in 10 minutes you'll be talking about what the folks in the City of Bohane call the "lost times." You'll be talking about what shop was where, how much a burrito used to cost, and where the best places were for music. For the Irish of Bohane though, the lost times were invariable violent. And the violence gave them a gravity. Yet the violence was rarely remembered for the honesty of loss and was looked forward to mark the passing of time. "y'sure 'bout that, H? 'nother winter a blood in Bohane, like? "Ah sure it'll make the long old nights fly past."

The fatalism is felt deep in Bohane. "Whatever's wrong with us is coming in off the river. No argument: the taint of badness on the city's air is a taint off that river." Barry's book is set in the future, but the ideas have a deeper history in Irish literature and culture. And if Barry's plot structure is any indication, things won't be changing much.

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Jul 13, 2012 Pierce rated it 4 of 5 stars

Well. I actually began reading this months ago, and I had to put it down for a little while. This was because I felt it to be treading dangerously close to a project I've been working on, and I got freaked out. A kind of Ireland post-technology thing.

I finished it the other day. It's not actually that similar to this other thing. But it kind of is from far enough away.

Firstly, I'd be really interested to hear the opinions of any non-Irish out there who've read this. The whole novel is narrated b...more

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Jul 07, 2012 Matthew Geyer rated it 4 of 5 stars

Kevin Barry is going to be somebody. That's what I thought when I read his apocalyptic short story in The New Yorker, Fjord of Killary, a year or two ago. This sent me searching the web, where I found his previous short story collection, There Are Little Kingdoms, available from a small Irish literary press by way of an independent overseas bookseller. Kevin Barry already is somebody, I thought when I read those tales: He's an heir to William Trevor, like Banville and Toibin. But this one's ten...more Kevin Barry is going to be somebody. That's what I thought when I read his apocalyptic short story in The New Yorker, Fjord of Killary, a year or two ago. This sent me searching the web, where I found his previous short story collection, There Are Little Kingdoms, available from a small Irish literary press by way of an independent overseas bookseller. Kevin Barry already is somebody, I thought when I read those tales: He's an heir to William Trevor, like Banville and Toibin. But this one's ten or twenty years younger than those, so the line is growing at a natural, Irish pace.

In his first novel, published last year in Europe and this year in the US, Barry explores the devolution of western society and culture in a futuristic tale that is anything but science fiction. The language of the book, both the dialogue and the narration, represent what will become of the English language by 2053 if the current course holds. A melange of hip-hop drug-running street-slang wafts through the streets of a fictional coastal town in the West of Ireland, where the polluted Bohane river emerges from the Irish countryside--aka "The Big Nothin', ya sketch?--to flow through the city of the same name to a blackened sea. On the south side of the river, Smoketown is a place of sex parlors and opium dens, all run on graft, young hoors shaved head to toe, and tribal inheritances and alliances soon to be shaken yet again when an old chieftain rolls back into town. Up the slope on the other side of the river, the Northside Rises are home to another nest of criminals and hooligans. In between, what serves as the establishment--even the blue bloods are cynical and uncouth in this land--are soon needing to prepare for the worst. Nary a cell-phone or a laptop or a satellite dish in sight, gang fights and melees are fought with knuckles and knives and old-time savagery. And there is hell to pay, one way or another.

Kevin Barry. Check any of it out, including City of Bohane. A young Irish writer of this caliber is a new world treasure.
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May 23, 2012 Agnes Benis rated it 4 of 5 stars

At first I thought this book went backward in time; I thought it was a take-off on the Wild West OK Corrall, complete with Indians (Pikeys) or on a Mafia gangware theme. It has those elements except that it goes forward in time, even though there is not one iota of modern technology there are no phones even and people actually write letters.

It is a very imaginative and inventive (even the language) story that keeps you engaged to find out what will happen next. The meanings of words and terms u...more At first I thought this book went backward in time; I thought it was a take-off on the Wild West OK Corrall, complete with Indians (Pikeys) or on a Mafia gangware theme. It has those elements except that it goes forward in time, even though there is not one iota of modern technology there are no phones even and people actually write letters.

It is a very imaginative and inventive (even the language) story that keeps you engaged to find out what will happen next. The meanings of words and terms unfold; the reader does not know their meaning immediately. The plot seems linear, but is not. What happens has a twist that the reader does not know until near the end. The love triangle is atypical.

The setting is a fictional Irish city on the verge of a showdown with a rival tribal group. The Fancy run by Logan rules Bohane; the Cusacks are restless and about to issue a challenge to his leadership. Logan's 90-year-old mother Girly is the woman behind the throne who really runs the show. Macu is Logan's wife. The Gant is the leader that Logan unseated. Wolfie Stanton and Fucker Burke are violent boy enforcers of Logan's dictates. Ching, a Chinese woman, member of the Fancy, and confidante of Girley.

The Gant returns to Bohane and the inhabitants are all astir as to what that will mean for Logan, Macu and the City. Macu had a brief affair with the Gant and he had asked her to leave Bohane with him when he left 25 years earlier. Logan is a jealous husband, questioning Macu about her daily activities and having Wolfie and Fucker follow her. Thus, he is very anxious regarding Macu and the Gant's return.

A gangwar ensues and Logan enlists the Pikeys to help beat the Cusacks, but at a price that the Pikeys will have a piece of the Fancy business. This is not popular as the Pikeys are considered low class. Loyalties are tested - Macu's, Wolfie's, Fucker's and even Girley's. The book has very violent scenes and also colorful characters in the newspaperman and Old Manion.

Macu tires of Logan's jealous ways and even though she loves him, leaves him. He and the Gant search for her, both love her. Ching will not betray Logan to Gant, but she endears herself to the real power, Girly. Burke will switch loyalties and pays with his murder by Logan. Wolfie remains loyal but is not the same with Fucker's murder. He sets out for vengence on the Cusack leader because Ching lies to him and tells him he made a pass at her. When that is done, Wolfie is going to take revenge on Logan for Burke's death. Ching, ambitious, is hoping the Cusack and Wolfie do each other in.

What unfolds is a pact between Logan and the Gant. The Gant had been allowed to return to Bohane if he would test the loyalties of the other characters. This is how The Gant wins and Logan undoes himself. He is too late to offer trust to Macu; he would have been better to offer amnesty to Fucker and win deeper loyalty and he would have maintained Wolfie's loyalty; his obsessive jealousy blinded him to Ching's ambitions; and his mother saw weakness. Logan writes to Macu and begs her return and to meet him in the bar at midnight of the festival. She is unsure. She is not unsure that she does not love the Gant, so does not turn to him. The woman who comes through the door at midnight is his mother to tell him that he is no longer leader; it is Ching.

The author invents words, puts "The" before Gant's name, describes clothing that defies anything seen on the runways of high fashion that one asks, "Who wears this?" Details of the clothing are also made-up words. Packaging is very important in this story. You have to look the part.

The book is unusual, inventive and some of the language very lyrical.

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May 07, 2012 Rob Kitchin rated it 2 of 5 stars

Kevin Barry is well known for his short stories. He has a vivid imagination and is an excellent wordsmith, crafting some lovely, expressive prose. City of Bohane has received high praise from some of Ireland’s literary stars such as Roddy Doyle, Joseph O’Connor and Hugo Hamilton. I therefore had high expectations for Barry’s first novel. With the exception of the prose and some of the characterisation, for me, it failed to deliver. For the most part, the characters are difficult to identify with...more Kevin Barry is well known for his short stories. He has a vivid imagination and is an excellent wordsmith, crafting some lovely, expressive prose. City of Bohane has received high praise from some of Ireland’s literary stars such as Roddy Doyle, Joseph O’Connor and Hugo Hamilton. I therefore had high expectations for Barry’s first novel. With the exception of the prose and some of the characterisation, for me, it failed to deliver. For the most part, the characters are difficult to identify with and I couldn’t have cared less what happened to them; they're a bunch of scoundrels hooked on vice and violence. The tale has no back story. We’re forty years into the future, Ireland seems to have slipped backwards a couple of hundred years minus the colonial rule, and we have no idea as to why this occurred or the general wider socio-political landscape of Ireland or Europe. Rather we’re isolated in a fictional city, with the sea on one side and surrounded by bog otherwise, and all we have is a nostalgia for a ‘lost-time’ that’s never explained. The plot is wafer thin and is largely feuding clans seeking to remain in charge of the city. My sense when I got to the end was, ‘yes, and?’ Given the literary plaudits, I was expecting a lot more and yet there is no great sociological, political or economic unveiling, no sense of philosophical or theological reflection, no feeling that story served any purpose. Barry does manage to create some sense of place, but the city is very simply structured into five zones, lacking the complexity of a real place and it’s really not clear how large a town it actually is. It felt quite small town to me, certainly not a large city. There is also a first person narrator who drifts in very occasionally and seemingly with no purpose. Barry rightly deserves the plaudits for his ability as a wordsmith, and there are some very nice passages in City of Bohane, but as a novel length story for me it fell short of what it could have been. (less)

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Apr 17, 2012 Trina rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction-general

As I said in my recent review for ForeWord Magazine, this novel reminded me of the West Side Story, with the Jets and the Sharks replaced by rival gangs from the bogs and gorsey wilds of western Ireland. It's set in the futuristic 2054, but could just as easily be 1954 given the fluidity of time and the nostalgia for long ago when Gant had the running of the Back Trace, a labyrinth of streets filled with grog shops, noodle joints, fetish parlours, needle alleys, dream salons, and power haunts. B...more

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Apr 16, 2012 Jose Weeks rated it 4 of 5 stars

It begins with a wave of tainted air blowing in off the Bohane river. Cutting through that "sweet badness" is Logan Hartnett, the Long Fella, the Albino, a man who runs things in this city—and this novel, City of Bohane. It begins in long shot: Hartnett is seen walking not long after a knifing. Walking upright, shoulders back, like a general. Walking home from a declaration of war.

It is October, some time in the early 2050's, and winter in this west-coast Irish city has a bitter edge to it. Desp

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It begins with a wave of tainted air blowing in off the Bohane river. Cutting through that "sweet badness" is Logan Hartnett, the Long Fella, the Albino, a man who runs things in this city—and this novel, City of Bohane. It begins in long shot: Hartnett is seen walking not long after a knifing. Walking upright, shoulders back, like a general. Walking home from a declaration of war.

It is October, some time in the early 2050's, and winter in this west-coast Irish city has a bitter edge to it. Despite his gait, there is no spoiling for a fight in Mr. Hartnett any longer, but a rival family has been encroaching. They've sensed weakness. And a response was needed.

An old rival is said to be in town. A big fella. Intentions unknown.

And the Long Fella, the 'Bino, is beginning to show his age.

City of Bohane is the debut novel by Kevin Barry, an Irishman with a knack for economical prose and an ear for the music of dialect. It is a novel of many things—violence, post-apocalypse, gang warfare, even fashion—but it has the sense not to be about any of these. It is a very good novel.

The gang warfare, or clan warfare, could be set in any time and place that lacks the structure of an effective government. In the Ireland forty years after our time, something has happened to eliminate much of the technology and structure ubiquitous to the present. There may be bits of technology and a scattering of machines still in use, but society seems to have fallen back to pre-industrial levels. The only apparent professions are butcher, barkeep, "hoor," and newsman.

But this is not science fiction, not speculative fiction, not about the year or the intervening changes. The setting provides a tone, a sense of otherworldliness, a blank score ready to be filled with the music of the Bohane dialect. Barry shows little interest in the other baggage of post-apocalypse. It could be set anywhere, or nowhere.

This is a novel about plumage and territoriality and jealousy. This is a novel about just what sort of pack animals we really are.

This is an excerpt of my review at readreread.com.

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Mar 13, 2012 T. Edmund rated it 3 of 5 stars

Set in the future (or at least in a place that believes 2053 has long past) The City of Bohane is a brutal place run by gangsta Irish, and their 'hoors'

In this future, or alternative universe, language is much changed. For some this will mean an original refreshing novel, for some (myself) this will mean a confusing mash of bizarre prose and difficult to follow plot.

While an obvious comparison is made to A Clockwork Orange, Barry fails to achieve the same level of moral, political and personal c...more

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Dec 14, 2011 Ethel Rohan rated it 5 of 5 stars

Kevin Barry is a genius. He is doing with his life and his gift exactly what he was put on this earth to do and continues the long and great line of Irish writers. His debut novel City of Bohane is an original and remarkable work of inventiveness.

Set in the fictional and futuristic city of Bohane, somewhere in the West of Ireland in 2053, this is a dark and harrowing tale that is at turns horrific and stunning. For all the memorable and well-dressed characters, gripping plot twists, and brillian...more

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Dec 29, 2012 Bart rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a wholly original prose style wrapped round a somewhat original narrative style wrapped round a well-worn plot. But the telling is original enough to make a reader forget how many times he's seen this plot before.

If the best novels teach their readers how to read them, Kevin Barry certainly has that ambition in City of Bohane. What is nearly nonsensical in the opening 15 pages of this novel feels nearly natural in its closing 15. Barry has the Irish affliction of sacrificing clarity for...more

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May 08, 2013 Ken Mannion marked it as to-read

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Jan 23, 2012 Bloody rated it 2 of 5 stars

Kevin Barry’s City of Bohane is an unusual novel, one of those rare debut efforts that displays more than enough craft, originality and raw talent on the part of the author but ultimately falls short of fulfilling its potential.

Set forty years in the future in a fictional city on Ireland’s windswept western seaboard, City of Bohane details the power struggles and emotional crises of several underworld figures, primarily Logan Hartnett, who commands the most powerful mob and ostensibly has Bohan...more Kevin Barry’s City of Bohane is an unusual novel, one of those rare debut efforts that displays more than enough craft, originality and raw talent on the part of the author but ultimately falls short of fulfilling its potential.

Set forty years in the future in a fictional city on Ireland’s windswept western seaboard, City of Bohane details the power struggles and emotional crises of several underworld figures, primarily Logan Hartnett, who commands the most powerful mob and ostensibly has Bohane in the palm of his hand. The scales tip and alliances shift, however, when an old foe of Logan’s returns after a long absence and looks keen to settle an old score.

Like the sound of that? Well, I’m afraid that’s as good as it gets. The synopsis of this novel reads like a state-of-the-art HBO pilot, full of grit, hyperrealism and Machiavellian plotting, but the novel never actually delivers on its initial promise.

Although Barry is an acclaimed author of short fiction, this is his first novel, and it certainly reads like a debut effort. His main flaw, and it’s a glaring one I’m afraid, is his characterisation. It’s thin at best, the characters drawn in very broad strokes, with the author often relying on gimmicks and quirky imagery to ensure that the various players are at all memorable. From the feared, but actually rather passive, Logan Hartnett, to the depressive, obsessive Gant Broderick to the absolutely cardboard cutout Jenny Ching (complete with skintight jumpsuit straight out of a Tarantino film. You know the one I mean), the lead characters rely on cosy clichés from nearly a century’s worth of gangster films, noir thrillers and crime fiction to do the author’s work for him and flesh them out in the reader’s mind.

Furthermore, I feel that Barry’s almost cinematic eye for detail hinders his attempts at characterisation for the most part. Because their personalities, motivations and subplots were so under-developed, I found myself defining characters by the ‘visual cues’ set down by the author. Jenny ceased to become Jenny and became simply ‘the girl in the jumpsuit’, Fucker Burke evaporated into ‘the guy who really likes his dog’ and so on.
The one exception is Logan’s mother Girly, who shines as an example of what Kevin Barry can do when he sets his mind to twisting an old trope. We’ve seen the ‘mob mother’ character before, but here we have an Irish mob mother – a different creature altogether. Girly is ruthless, overbearing, foul-mouthed, alcoholic and utterly charming, a dazzling Technicolor personality in a novel filled with soulless archetypes.

On a more positive note, Barry has pulled off an admirable feat of world building with City of Bohane. Set in a vaguely dystopian future without cars or much technology (fuel shortages?), Barry’s world exists in it’s own context. Originally from Limerick, the author also spent some time in Cork, and elements of both cities are evident in his creation. From the craggy heights of the Northside Rises, lit by huge bonfires and pulsing with tribal unrest, to the narrow wynds and looming tenements of Smoketown and the hazy wilderness of the Big Nothin’ bog beyond, most Irish readers will likely find something to recognise or relate to in the makeup of Bohane. Barry’s flowing, descriptive prose and evocative imagery work much better when he takes the bird’s eye view over his creation, which is built up and added to with every chapter, leading me to believe that Bohane itself is probably the best character in the book.

There are many nice little touches that bring this future Ireland to life, dropped tantalisingly by the author here and there, such as the huge popularity of Calypso music, particularly among the youth, the neo-primitive Sand Pikeys with their Gaelic war-braids and feathers and the vague, but evocative, references to places like the ‘Black Atlantic’ and ‘the Nation Beyond’. This is perhaps the crux of why I found the novel so frustrating – the setting is so well-developed, imaginative and excellently written that the shallow characters really do stand out for their lack of the same.

All in all, City of Bohane is certainly not a terrible novel, nor even a bad one, but it is decidedly mediocre. Poor characterisation, some cringe-worthy invented patois (think teenage schoolboy slang from the early nineties) and a very under whelming climax made this a disappointing read, especially since the author is clearly quite talented and still worth looking out for in the future.
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Apr 12, 2012 zxvasdf rated it 5 of 5 stars

Bohane, a city on the Irish coast fed by a sick black river, is crime ridden. But... how can we call it crime if it is just a way of life? When everyone is actively engaged in a monstrous caricature of humanity, the dark manifesting in feints of genteel respectability? It's hard to see what value the Bohanites hold upon anything other than irrepressible self indulgence. Smoke and drink and carnality, amongst others is just parts in a day. People are people, they say, but the people of Bohane hav...more Bohane, a city on the Irish coast fed by a sick black river, is crime ridden. But... how can we call it crime if it is just a way of life? When everyone is actively engaged in a monstrous caricature of humanity, the dark manifesting in feints of genteel respectability? It's hard to see what value the Bohanites hold upon anything other than irrepressible self indulgence. Smoke and drink and carnality, amongst others is just parts in a day. People are people, they say, but the people of Bohane have been sucking in the air from the river.

There's magic in this book, in which the year of 2053 can seem so... dated. As if it were the early 1900s only the people dress cooler, and the knives are sharper, and the cruelty is more practiced. Honed. It's tomorrow, indeed. Something bad and big happened and the old ways have found to be as sturdy as ever.

There's something exceptional about British and Irish writers that somehow imbues the new with an ancient grace; you find the new things never really changed at all, and that the old things can be new again. They live on a ground filled with the ghosts of raw history, and it seeps into everything, especially in the mad minds of writers like Kevin Barry. People talented in sketching out a story in which you are required to peer in the emptiness between plot lines to ken the true happening.

This story is not only an aborted love story; it's a passing of the torch tale, the swan song of one dapper gentleman killer. The scales swing and shift as intrigues blows allegiances and confidences like a wynd through the Reaches. The Fancy is a man stumbling about in a maelstrom of events, but so dream-snared as to be consciously blind to it occurring. But it occurs. As he tried not to see it.

I've a mind our sly author will find himself, in the decades ahead a fadograph of the lost time, in possession of a cadre of old reel for the most self-indulgent of the wicked, and a voice compelled to yarn a tale of the ill wind that blows off the Big Nothin' on the bad black river Bohane. (less)

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Nov 27, 2012 Garry rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I mentioned in a previous review that the Irish are a dark, dark people. My evidence for this is based on my limited experience of Irish literature, which I shall now describe...

Book 1: The Sea, suicide by drowning
Book 2: The Gathering, suicide by drowning
Book 3: Skippy Dies, suicide
Book 4: The Master, drowning
Book 5: City of Bohane, graphic depiction of a disembowelling and several other atrocities

Yes, in a world of dark, dark people, Kevin Barry is the darkest of them all.

It's the near-future...more

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May 09, 2013 Zoeytron rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: first-reads

What a tasty feast this was! I suspect this book will either be devoured with great relish or it will have you demanding to be excused from the table - pronto. Be prepared for something different from almost any other book you might pick up to read. A fresh idea, what a novelty!

As the story opens, the city 'had taken to the winter like an old dog to its blanket'. Bohane is over-run with street gangs. The reader will need to hang tough with the street jargon and just roll with it. Context is kin...more

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Feb 18, 2013 Mitch Lindsay rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Hyped beyond belief, I was wary. Kevin Barry is a very funny writer, I have read some of his previous short story stuff and found them very humorous. He has a very distinctive Irish, dark humour which translates onto page near flawlessy. This book sees Barry engage in a semi-invented slang narrative that just doesn't work for me. Whilst reading it I was reminded of "clockwork orange" and "trainspotting" but whereas Burroughs and Welsh go the whole hog in language and narrative, Barry frames the...more

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Oct 28, 2012 Susan Ritz rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: literary-fiction

Wow, wow and wow again! This book is something completely outside my comfort zone and thank goodness! Every time I picked it up I felt like was entering some alternate universe of language. Though it took me a few pages to get the hang of what was going on, when I did I got completely swept up in the rollicking reality Barry creates. Though there are no illustrations, the writing is so eye-poppingly vivid I could have sworn I was reading a graphic novel. The descriptions of the characters (esp....more

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Oct 21, 2012 Amy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I really loved this book.

I mean, I really, thoroughly, enjoyed it before returning it to the local library.

The dialect is quick, sharp, and often snarky. The characters are vivid ( to say the least ), propelling you through an alternate Irish universe rife with warring gangs, drugs, winding, dilapidated streets, and a darkening mood of pride, loyalty, and superstition. It's a thrill ride of a book that will get you alternatively squirming or laughing publicly. A cacophonous, wandering plot you...more

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May 07, 2012 katie rated it 2 of 5 stars

At first I loved it. The language, the dialogue is amazing, and really new, as in not like anything I have read before. I did find fault with the story line, the twist seemed ridiculous. So the plot couldn't carry the good language, because for me the language even got tired, because it did not evolve, and the weak plot left it stagnant. The stereotypes, the misogyny, the bad mouthing all just started to feel vacuous.
The author, clearly, has a gifted ear for sound and language. But he isn't ver...more

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Jun 06, 2012 Donna Jo Atwood rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2012-summer-challenge, dystophia, ireland

Warning: Bleakness abounds here. Do not read if suffering from depression.
I had to make a couple starts on this book. Reading the story of this power struggle between two old antagonists and the younger up-and-coming was like trying to read a book in a language you only half understood. I'm not sure if it was the author's intention, but it certain increased the discomfort level in reading about a city that's gone to hell in something a lot bigger than a handbasket.
Once I got into the book, I fou...more

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