What do you think?
Rate this book
Bad Blood: A Walk Along the Irish Border
Soon after the Anglo-Irish Agreement, when the tension was at a peak in Northern Ireland, Colm Tóibín travelled along the Irish border from Derry to Newry. Bad Blood tells of fear and anger, and of the historical legacy that has imprinted itself on the landscape and its inhabitants. Marches, demonstrations and funerals are the rituals observed by the communities that live along this route. With insight and intelligence Tóibín listens to the stories that are told, and unfolds for the reader the complex unhapiness of this fraught border. ‘Tóibín has the narrative poise of Brian Moore and the patient eye for domestic detail of John McGahern, but he is very much his own man.’ Kate Kellaway, Observer ‘High class reportage...Tóibín was conscientious about talking to real people, not just “names” with a good line in TV chat, and went to see and hear and sense things at a local, grassroots level’ Irish Times
208 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1988
About the author
Colm Tóibín
236 books5,699 followersColm Tóibín FRSL, is an Irish novelist, short story writer, essayist, playwright, journalist, critic, and poet. Tóibín is currently Irene and Sidney B. Silverman Professor of the Humanities at Columbia University in Manhattan and succeeded Martin Amis as professor of creative writing at the University of Manchester.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 74 reviews
June 27, 2018
This book was originally published as Walking Along the Border in 1987. It was republished in 1994 with a new title, and without the photographs. I suppose the new title was intended to draw readers interested in Northern Ireland, as well as to reflect that this book is more than a travelogue. Toibin, at the time he wrote this, was 32, living in Dublin, and working as a journalist. This was the first of three non-fiction books he wrote that could be categorized as "travelogues". The other two are Homage to Barcelona (1990) and The Sign of the Cross: Travels in Catholic Europe (1994).
This book, like other books that are ostensibly about travel, is a study of the history and people, including a few writers, along the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Toíbin made his trip during the height of the Troubles.* Toíbin walked the border in order to see up close what it meant. Everywhere there were cement blockades, and other obstacles to stop traffic from using border crossings. Many (probably most bridges) were destroyed. This website features many interviews with residents along the border: http://www.borderroadmemories.com/
Toíbin walked through rain, bad weather, British Army checkpoints, and at times hostile locals. It is understandable that the sight of a stranger walking through near empty countryside could be startling. At times, he walks miles through bad weather to a town that reportedly has a hotel, to find it has closed. Many local and small businesses closed during the Troubles. Sometimes it was after the closing of a bridge or border crossing meant that business dried up. Other times, they were victims of bombings or other attacks. The bridge crossings divided communities that had lived in harmony despite the border for decades. Some of the closings dated back to the late 1950's. a time when a decimated IRA carried on a fruitless "Border Campaign".
Toíbin is skilled at befriending locals and gaining some trust. He interviews victims of atrocities, and in one interview, a survivor who has been reluctant to talk to the media over the previous ten years, opens up to Toíbin. In a couple of situations where strong sectarian suspicions freeze him out, he manages to befriend a key local resident who lets others know the Toíbin is OK. He also has friends living in the areas he is traveling who occasionally come to his rescue when he is stranded by bad weather, and/or in a place with no accommodations. In the age before mobile phones, and the internet, travelers were heavily dependent on the goodwill of locals. There were, of course, no local tourist offices to give advice. It was a "seat of your pants" way of traveling. Considering he was traveling through areas that were essentially "war zones", it was a remarkable journey. Toíbin, however, wasn't the first to write about traveling in Northern Ireland during these years. Dervla Murphy's remarkable book A Place Apart(1978) tells of traveling by bicycle through Northern Ireland, almost a decade before Toíbin.
Toíbin's future as a writer of literary fiction is apparent in this book. On his visit to Enniskillen, he writes about the great writer John McGahern, who lived just south of the border, but as Toíbin writes" Enniskillen was sort of a capital for him". Toíbin goes on to write:
He had written so well, so accurately, in such detail, about the world just south of the border that his work was almost more real than the places themselves. It was a time when the police had nothing to do except arrest cyclists for having no lights, when there were no cars on the road, when personal isolation and pain found no comfort in the monolith southern Ireland had become.
This is a book for anyone interested in Northern Ireland, as well as fans of Toíbin. Highly recommended.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-i...
* The other night at a reading by Northern Irish native Nick Laird, he was in conversation with a local writer who commented to me that he found it "interesting" that the 30 year war in Northern Ireland was referred to as "the Troubles", an understatement, to say the least.
This book, like other books that are ostensibly about travel, is a study of the history and people, including a few writers, along the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Toíbin made his trip during the height of the Troubles.* Toíbin walked the border in order to see up close what it meant. Everywhere there were cement blockades, and other obstacles to stop traffic from using border crossings. Many (probably most bridges) were destroyed. This website features many interviews with residents along the border: http://www.borderroadmemories.com/
Toíbin walked through rain, bad weather, British Army checkpoints, and at times hostile locals. It is understandable that the sight of a stranger walking through near empty countryside could be startling. At times, he walks miles through bad weather to a town that reportedly has a hotel, to find it has closed. Many local and small businesses closed during the Troubles. Sometimes it was after the closing of a bridge or border crossing meant that business dried up. Other times, they were victims of bombings or other attacks. The bridge crossings divided communities that had lived in harmony despite the border for decades. Some of the closings dated back to the late 1950's. a time when a decimated IRA carried on a fruitless "Border Campaign".
Toíbin is skilled at befriending locals and gaining some trust. He interviews victims of atrocities, and in one interview, a survivor who has been reluctant to talk to the media over the previous ten years, opens up to Toíbin. In a couple of situations where strong sectarian suspicions freeze him out, he manages to befriend a key local resident who lets others know the Toíbin is OK. He also has friends living in the areas he is traveling who occasionally come to his rescue when he is stranded by bad weather, and/or in a place with no accommodations. In the age before mobile phones, and the internet, travelers were heavily dependent on the goodwill of locals. There were, of course, no local tourist offices to give advice. It was a "seat of your pants" way of traveling. Considering he was traveling through areas that were essentially "war zones", it was a remarkable journey. Toíbin, however, wasn't the first to write about traveling in Northern Ireland during these years. Dervla Murphy's remarkable book A Place Apart(1978) tells of traveling by bicycle through Northern Ireland, almost a decade before Toíbin.
Toíbin's future as a writer of literary fiction is apparent in this book. On his visit to Enniskillen, he writes about the great writer John McGahern, who lived just south of the border, but as Toíbin writes" Enniskillen was sort of a capital for him". Toíbin goes on to write:
He had written so well, so accurately, in such detail, about the world just south of the border that his work was almost more real than the places themselves. It was a time when the police had nothing to do except arrest cyclists for having no lights, when there were no cars on the road, when personal isolation and pain found no comfort in the monolith southern Ireland had become.
This is a book for anyone interested in Northern Ireland, as well as fans of Toíbin. Highly recommended.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-i...
* The other night at a reading by Northern Irish native Nick Laird, he was in conversation with a local writer who commented to me that he found it "interesting" that the 30 year war in Northern Ireland was referred to as "the Troubles", an understatement, to say the least.
May 25, 2026
La versión que he leído es en castellano. Se hace una traducción literal del título; Bad blood como Mala sangre, que no significa lo mismo: en inglés, significa rencor, una mala predisposición entre dos personas o grupos.
Colm Toibin narra la crónica de su recorrida como mochilero, en la década del ’80, a lo largo de la frontera entre las dos Irlandas, desde Derry en el Atlántico, hasta la costa del Mar de Irlanda (que separa a la isla de Gran Bretaña).
Siguiendo los caminos trazados, atravesaba inevitablemente, una y otra vez la frontera, encontrando incluso una casa atravesada por la línea divisoria.
Durante el viaje visitó y se alojó con amigos, habló con los lugareños, tanto a través de entrevistas con figuras conocidas como con personas del común que cruzaba en su trayecto, que encontraba en pubs o que lo alojaban.
Fue completando un mosaico muy rico para comprender mejor la realidad de una zona marcada por una larga historia de rencores (bad blood) y violencia, con todas sus variantes.
Observa, sobre todo entre la gente común, que parece predominar el deseo de dejar todo atrás y dedicarse a una vida tranquila de familia, amigos y trabajo. Y que de este deseo con frecuencia son arrancados por acciones que apelan a provocar su indignación.
En el cierre del libro, elige un episodio que recogió para ilustrarlo: tres hermanos católicos son asesinados por los paramilitares protestantes; y pese a que su padre pide que no haya represalias, al día siguiente un grupo de católicos secuestra un ómnibus laboral, y matan a todos sus integrantes, dejando vivo al único católico (que lamenta amargamente la muerte de sus amigos y compañeros de trabajo. Como una señal de esperanza, el superviviente católico y el padre de los tres muchachos hoy son amigos.
Una muy buena crónica, que ayuda a comprender y desnudar la naturaleza de un conflicto con muchos elementos de irracionalidad. Y ha sido muy rica y valiosa la modalidad de ir al lugar, recorrer y escuchar a la gente.
Colm Toibin narra la crónica de su recorrida como mochilero, en la década del ’80, a lo largo de la frontera entre las dos Irlandas, desde Derry en el Atlántico, hasta la costa del Mar de Irlanda (que separa a la isla de Gran Bretaña).
Siguiendo los caminos trazados, atravesaba inevitablemente, una y otra vez la frontera, encontrando incluso una casa atravesada por la línea divisoria.
Durante el viaje visitó y se alojó con amigos, habló con los lugareños, tanto a través de entrevistas con figuras conocidas como con personas del común que cruzaba en su trayecto, que encontraba en pubs o que lo alojaban.
Fue completando un mosaico muy rico para comprender mejor la realidad de una zona marcada por una larga historia de rencores (bad blood) y violencia, con todas sus variantes.
Observa, sobre todo entre la gente común, que parece predominar el deseo de dejar todo atrás y dedicarse a una vida tranquila de familia, amigos y trabajo. Y que de este deseo con frecuencia son arrancados por acciones que apelan a provocar su indignación.
En el cierre del libro, elige un episodio que recogió para ilustrarlo: tres hermanos católicos son asesinados por los paramilitares protestantes; y pese a que su padre pide que no haya represalias, al día siguiente un grupo de católicos secuestra un ómnibus laboral, y matan a todos sus integrantes, dejando vivo al único católico (que lamenta amargamente la muerte de sus amigos y compañeros de trabajo. Como una señal de esperanza, el superviviente católico y el padre de los tres muchachos hoy son amigos.
Una muy buena crónica, que ayuda a comprender y desnudar la naturaleza de un conflicto con muchos elementos de irracionalidad. Y ha sido muy rica y valiosa la modalidad de ir al lugar, recorrer y escuchar a la gente.
September 15, 2025
I lived in Ireland when this book was published and I recall To`ibin being interviewed about it on RTE. I wanted to read the book then but just did not get around to it. When I came across it on Amazon, I realized it was time. The value of the book lies not alone in the absurd way that the border was drawn but it also describes in great detail just how much damage was done along the border.
I suspect it was another example of Churchill drawing borders in countries that he did not understand and probably did not care. One house lies partly in the North and partly in the South. One advantage of that was the homeowners could basically decide themselves whether they wanted to pay taxes in the North or in the South. The cheapest won out. One thing about which there would have been no debate about was that they would purchase their petrol in the North where it was cheaper. Other products were cheaper in the North as well: alcohol and cigarettes are an example. But it wasn't just a matter of the border running through one house. It was so poorly drawn that if one were driving (or walking as Toibin did) you would pass in and out of the Republic over and over again- sometimes there might be 5 feet in the North and then back to the South. In some places, you were in and out several times in the course of a short journey. Some roads were blocked, sometimes permanently, leaving farmers to drive 20 miles out of their way just to get to the other side of their field. But that was not the most tragic aspect of the border.
Most of the violence that occurred was along the border. We used to visit the North quite a bit because at the time, there were more shops there than in the South. Several times, we could see the aftermath of a bombing, but never when it happened, but streets would be blocked and broken glass and other bits of debris would be scattered around. As the author made his journey, he described the remnants of the violence. Villages that were destroyed; empty houses where the inhabitants had left for England, America or the South. Churches that were destroyed, shops, pubs, and other businesses destroyed by the bombs. Of course, the worst were the lives that all that damage represented. Places that had once had a mixed population of Catholics and Protestants who gotten along previously disappeared. When the author described the survivors, he talked about the sadness and hopelessly of the place.
This is a great book with great information written by someone who was empathetic and observant. My wish is that someone would take the same journey, returning to the places Toibin visited and updating it. This was written in the 80's before the Good Friday Agreement and the end of the Troubles. I would love to hear whether healing has taken place.
I suspect it was another example of Churchill drawing borders in countries that he did not understand and probably did not care. One house lies partly in the North and partly in the South. One advantage of that was the homeowners could basically decide themselves whether they wanted to pay taxes in the North or in the South. The cheapest won out. One thing about which there would have been no debate about was that they would purchase their petrol in the North where it was cheaper. Other products were cheaper in the North as well: alcohol and cigarettes are an example. But it wasn't just a matter of the border running through one house. It was so poorly drawn that if one were driving (or walking as Toibin did) you would pass in and out of the Republic over and over again- sometimes there might be 5 feet in the North and then back to the South. In some places, you were in and out several times in the course of a short journey. Some roads were blocked, sometimes permanently, leaving farmers to drive 20 miles out of their way just to get to the other side of their field. But that was not the most tragic aspect of the border.
Most of the violence that occurred was along the border. We used to visit the North quite a bit because at the time, there were more shops there than in the South. Several times, we could see the aftermath of a bombing, but never when it happened, but streets would be blocked and broken glass and other bits of debris would be scattered around. As the author made his journey, he described the remnants of the violence. Villages that were destroyed; empty houses where the inhabitants had left for England, America or the South. Churches that were destroyed, shops, pubs, and other businesses destroyed by the bombs. Of course, the worst were the lives that all that damage represented. Places that had once had a mixed population of Catholics and Protestants who gotten along previously disappeared. When the author described the survivors, he talked about the sadness and hopelessly of the place.
This is a great book with great information written by someone who was empathetic and observant. My wish is that someone would take the same journey, returning to the places Toibin visited and updating it. This was written in the 80's before the Good Friday Agreement and the end of the Troubles. I would love to hear whether healing has taken place.
August 13, 2015
Reading this book now when Northern drivers flock to petrol stations in the Republic for cheap fuel (to stations which had little business at the time Toibin writes), while Southerners stream across custom-less, and checkpoint-less borders for cheap booze, makes it stark how much has changed in the two decades plus that have passed. But it also shows how deep the conflict ran. It is a book that all people from this island of Ireland should read.
May 24, 2019
I had traveled to Ireland a few years before Toibin went on his trek and was quite familiar with some of the people and events that he described.Colm is a great writer.
May 28, 2026
I appear to be in a minority of one when it comes to most of Colm Toibin's writing which I find flat and almost unreadable. I loved some of his earlier novels but have hated more recent ones. His non-fiction I have found particularly jejune.
What I disliked in particular is that there is no context, historically, to Toibin's reportage but also no reason is given as to why he decided to walk along the border, what he hoped to discover or what depth of knowledge or experience he brings to the project (when it comes to writing about the border I recommend this 2018 article by Fintin O'Toole: https://www.theguardian.com/books/201... - and advise you strongly to search out the writings of Eugene McCabe which he strongly recommends).
The paucity of reason or even knowledge was something I had previously encountered in Toibin's 'At the Sign of the Cross' and I can't help feeling that there is an enormous whiff of arrogance in both books. Toibin seems to regard his enormous self regard of himself as Ireland's premier writer and intellectual as sufficient justification for pompously and pointlessly recounting banalities which become significant because he has written about them.
The border is something immensely complicated and personal and simply telling sad tales does no good - particularly in a work so weightless of fact that I have read reviews on GR were the writer believes the border was something drawn - like that dividing Punjab - by the British and by Winston Churchill in particular. Perhaps Toibin imagines that was how it was created - it wasn't - but facts are of little import to Toibin.
So I didn't like this book - I can't say I hated it - it bored me - but mostly it reminded me why Toibin is not the great Irish writer of his generation - but only an interloper in the place that should be filled by Desmond Hogan.
What I disliked in particular is that there is no context, historically, to Toibin's reportage but also no reason is given as to why he decided to walk along the border, what he hoped to discover or what depth of knowledge or experience he brings to the project (when it comes to writing about the border I recommend this 2018 article by Fintin O'Toole: https://www.theguardian.com/books/201... - and advise you strongly to search out the writings of Eugene McCabe which he strongly recommends).
The paucity of reason or even knowledge was something I had previously encountered in Toibin's 'At the Sign of the Cross' and I can't help feeling that there is an enormous whiff of arrogance in both books. Toibin seems to regard his enormous self regard of himself as Ireland's premier writer and intellectual as sufficient justification for pompously and pointlessly recounting banalities which become significant because he has written about them.
The border is something immensely complicated and personal and simply telling sad tales does no good - particularly in a work so weightless of fact that I have read reviews on GR were the writer believes the border was something drawn - like that dividing Punjab - by the British and by Winston Churchill in particular. Perhaps Toibin imagines that was how it was created - it wasn't - but facts are of little import to Toibin.
So I didn't like this book - I can't say I hated it - it bored me - but mostly it reminded me why Toibin is not the great Irish writer of his generation - but only an interloper in the place that should be filled by Desmond Hogan.
September 7, 2020
This was an incredibly moving read. It's one of those rare books on the subject that isn't trying to make a point or a statement -- it just presents the facts as they are, from a very specific and personal angle, and lets the reader draw their own conclusions. Some parts of this book are obviously focused on the Troubles, other parts have nothing to do with them and instead focus on the many other things that can be found in the border area; throughout the whole thing, regardless of the subject being discussed, the border is constantly there in stark reminders like abandoned houses and ruined roads. It's quite a bleak read, if I'm honest, but somehow it manages to not be so depressing that it's not enjoyable. It's beautifully written, combining the best kind of travel writing with the best kind of reporting and memoir. It's a strange combination, but it works.
Books like this can be strange for me, because it puts something that I took for granted in a new light. Growing up in the North and seeing places I recognise and have my own memories of written about in such a way really brings it home that nothing about this situation was normal, and even though I knew that at the time I was growing up, I had other things to worry about. By the time I was born the modern conflict had been going on for over two decades. It had become background to my life and everyone around me, while not happy about it, had adapted to it. It's only reading something like this that makes me realise the weight of what was happening around me and what I lived through -- the horror of the situation, really. This book certainly proves that just because you grow up and live in a place certainly doesn't mean you can't stop learning new things about it. This was an incredibly fascinating perspective.
Personal factors aside, this was simply a brilliantly written book. Very easy to read, rich with detail, very casual and matter-of-fact, romantic and humorous in some places and devastating in others, it would make a fascinating read even for those not overly interested in the conflict. For those who are, this is a must-read.
Books like this can be strange for me, because it puts something that I took for granted in a new light. Growing up in the North and seeing places I recognise and have my own memories of written about in such a way really brings it home that nothing about this situation was normal, and even though I knew that at the time I was growing up, I had other things to worry about. By the time I was born the modern conflict had been going on for over two decades. It had become background to my life and everyone around me, while not happy about it, had adapted to it. It's only reading something like this that makes me realise the weight of what was happening around me and what I lived through -- the horror of the situation, really. This book certainly proves that just because you grow up and live in a place certainly doesn't mean you can't stop learning new things about it. This was an incredibly fascinating perspective.
Personal factors aside, this was simply a brilliantly written book. Very easy to read, rich with detail, very casual and matter-of-fact, romantic and humorous in some places and devastating in others, it would make a fascinating read even for those not overly interested in the conflict. For those who are, this is a must-read.
November 21, 2017
Fascinating, earthy account of the everyday tensions on the Northern Ireland border in the late '80s. Unfortunately somewhat mystifying and meandering for the less historically knowledgeable reader. The most interesting thing was probably just how mundane the walk comes across when he is effectively walking in an ongoing warzone. Also made me want to read more on the topic of migrant fairs and the exploitation of Catholic workers by Protestant landowners, which had a clear legacy and role in the conflict.
February 15, 2016
Very good. A bit hard to follow at times as he assumes more familiarity with then-current (1986) events than is likely at this late date. His observational powers are phenomenal, so the travelogue portions are as affecting in their way the reportage from the border in the wake of Anglo-Irish Agreement. A real writer's piece of journalism in the best sense.
November 16, 2019
Brilliant and heart-wrenching.
April 10, 2019
In the summer following the Anglo-Irish agreement of 1985, Colm Toibin set off to walk the length of the Irish border from Derry-Londonderry to Newry. More than thirty years after his journey, Bad Blood is a fascinating record of a very different time (the Good Friday agreement that finally brought the Troubles to a close was still twelve years in the future, and the Anglo-Irish agreement had inflamed existing tensions, especially among Protestant communities). Toibin talks to ordinary people on both sides of the border caught up in the terrible cycle of violence, reprisal and sectarianism that played out along the length of his journey. Bad Blood is both a record of a time now passed and a warning of the dark forces that could be unleashed by a failure to take the border seriously in a post-Brexit world.
May 26, 2018
If you want to read a book about Ireland, this would be an interesting way to go. A different twist. Enjoyed it much, very clear and poignant.
March 29, 2025
(3.5/5)
If you don’t have any knowledge of The Troubles in Northern Ireland, this book may be a bit confusing. I personally didn’t go into this book with much knowledge, and found myself constantly having to look up acronyms and the names of different security forces and paramilitaries just to keep up. And, if you read this book, have a map of Ireland handy! The author, during his walk along the border, is continuously popping in and out of different towns, and as I read I found it important to know if those towns were in Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland. Overall, though, I enjoyed the book. The “travelogue” style made it a slow read, but not in a bad way. I finished the book wanting to learn more about this time in Ireland’s history. I would read more by this author.
If you don’t have any knowledge of The Troubles in Northern Ireland, this book may be a bit confusing. I personally didn’t go into this book with much knowledge, and found myself constantly having to look up acronyms and the names of different security forces and paramilitaries just to keep up. And, if you read this book, have a map of Ireland handy! The author, during his walk along the border, is continuously popping in and out of different towns, and as I read I found it important to know if those towns were in Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland. Overall, though, I enjoyed the book. The “travelogue” style made it a slow read, but not in a bad way. I finished the book wanting to learn more about this time in Ireland’s history. I would read more by this author.
January 10, 2021
Very interesting indeed. Born in Northern Ireland to Protestant father and Catholic mother and moved to England when I was 5, I have always been deliberately kept away from any talk or explanation of ‘The Troubles’ and the political situation there. At last this book shed a little light in a very readable way. Part travelogue - Colm’s summer walk through the border towns, and part historical facts and commentary. The book painted an atmospheric picture of the towns, villages and countryside that he walked through and the characters he met, and also detailed some of the political history, killings and tensions between communities, paramilitary organisations and the British Government. Compelling enough to make me want to find out more and I did lots of googling as I was reading to get even more detail about some of the events and characters. Unusual and worthwhile book, though somewhat niche.
July 24, 2025
really nice journalistic description of what its like to walk across the northern ireland border for a year during the troubles. some parts are kinda boring but thats because its a persons life. most bombings and shootings are heard on the radio or read in the newspaper, also for people in northern ireland.
also respect for the town crossmaglen because whenever the army would block or blow up a bridge they'd just go out and rebuild it instantly so at some point the army gave up, good example of grassroots/individual action
also respect for the town crossmaglen because whenever the army would block or blow up a bridge they'd just go out and rebuild it instantly so at some point the army gave up, good example of grassroots/individual action
December 7, 2019
Can be a bit of a dry read for the unitiated, but the stories Toibin shares from individuals and the lives they live on the border during the Troubles is fascinating. People just try to live their lives, independent of their ethnic and sectarian identities, but their identities can sometimes overcome their way of life, independent of any choices they made or situations they tried to avoid.
April 19, 2020
A « high class reportage » indeed, as described by the Irish times. A valuable and seizing « walk along the Irish border », helping to understand. Grief, healing, faces and words, wounds, past, present and future.
February 17, 2025
In 1985 a pilgrimage to Lough Derg cost 10 Irish Pounds. Adjusting for the conversion of Irish Pounds to British pounds, inflation, and the conversion to Euro, this is the equivalent of roughly 24 euro. A 3 day pilgrimage to Lough Derg will cost 85 euro this summer.
December 29, 2025
Slow but you feel like you're walking across Ireland's border with Colm, so lovely!
June 17, 2024
Fantastic.
Searing, honest, full of humanity.
Searing, honest, full of humanity.
June 25, 2023
“The house was decorated in the style now customary all over Ireland: multi-coloured carpets, multi-coloured curtains, multi-coloured wallpaper, multi-coloured pictures on the wall. No one, surrounded by so much colour, could remember their ancestors, or their immediate forebears, without considerable pride and joy at how much things had improved. No more mud cabins, no more Puritan grey; Protestant and Catholic united in layer after layer of colours, carpets patterned in squares of red and yellow, wallpaper in long stripes of blue and gold, curtains in vivid pink and white. Riots of colour.”
more at timhoiland.com
more at timhoiland.com
April 23, 2025
I’ve been reading quite a few books by Irish writers this year. I only made the connection while I was reading this one that it might be my form of grieving for my parents, both of whom have died over the last 18 months or so. This one is connected to my mother, in some ways. Maybe a decade ago I saw this book going cheap somewhere – I’m a bit of a tragic when it comes to cheap books by authors I’ve enjoyed. And this one sounded interesting. Anyway, my mum saw it and asked me about it. I told her I really liked the author. She borrowed it. A little while later she brought it back. “God, I wish I hadn’t read that – what did you think of it?” I told her I hadn’t read it yet. She looked at me witheringly. “What did you get me to read it for, then?”
Now, given all of that – I wasn’t rushing to read the book. But then, last week, I found it again and was curious to see what had upset her about it so much. Well, you know, other than the obvious, that it is about the insane hatred between Catholics and Protestants that my mother had spent a lifetime opposed to, organising against and trying to overcome even in her own family. My lifelong disgust at racism is perhaps the greatest gift I received from my parents. I was expecting something truly horrible to happen in this book – and so I was a bit disappointed, or not disappointed so much as confused. I wish I’d read it at the time, I’d have loved to have known what had upset my mum about it so much. But I left that one far too late.
Basically, this is a book about Colm walking the border between North and South – making his way through towns of very different loyalties. You forget when you live in Australia that accents mark you in places as small as Ireland in ways that they don’t in somewhere as big as Australia. No one here says, ‘I can do a Perth accent’ or ‘Don’t you love the Sydney accent’. When we first came to Australia people were really only familiar with a Dublin accent, and so they struggled to believe we were from Ireland – our accent was not at all like what they took an ‘Irish’ accent to be. There are times in this where Colm decides that the better part of valour is to keep his mouth well and truly shut.
I’ve often thought that I would like to do the Camino. My daughter did large parts of it a few years ago and I’ve always loved the idea of going on a very long walk that has been done by so many people over so many centuries. And I love the idea of a pilgrimage – even if I’m not at all religious. There is something about it all that I find very appealing. My daughter told me the worst part of doing the Camino was that you really didn’t get to see very many Spanish people at all – but rather lots and lots of American Christians who were there for an epiphany and made it very clear they weren’t particularly happy with the idea that my daughter was not religious. I’m not sure I could be bothered having to justify myself to bigots – so, perhaps the Camino is off the agenda. A pity.
While I was reading this, Colm talks about a kind of pilgrimage he goes on – to an island where you spend days not sleeping and barely eating and walking about the place saying various prayers. When he started talking about this, I thought, oh, that might be an interesting thing to do. I’d have to learn the Hail Mary and things like that first, I guess, but it would be something of an experience. That feeling of curious possibility lasted for perhaps a page. I didn’t mind so much that the food was god-awful. All part of the redemptive experience, I figured – but the excessive boredom he describes put me off it entirely.
One of the things I found most interesting about this – and something that I’ve noticed about Irish people more generally – is that we are often taken to be a very gregarious people, people who will talk to you for hours at the local pub and share their entire lives with you. Except, what they share hides as much as it displays. Being Irish himself, this is a book showing this reticence as much as anything else. Men who were there when they lost friends to the Troubles and had never spoken about it to anyone since. This is a big theme in his novels too, of course. As my daughter said about Brooklyn and Long Island – why the hell don’t they just come out and say it? Why all the secrets? Why indeed.
The part of this that reminded me most of my mother was a part I misread. It went like this:
“He had a good singing voice and was known particularly for his rendering of ‘Danny Boy’. He was nicknamed ‘Danny’. On 14 May 1977 he went to The Three Steps Inn which that night was packed with local people. He sang two songs from the stage.”
A few times in this, Colm talks of going into pubs and listening to Irish folk music. I was raised on Irish folk music. But my mother always contrasted this with what she called American Irish songs (think MacNamara’s Band) or what she sometimes called Stage Irish. She would sometimes sing rude versions of these she’d learnt as a girl on the streets of Belfast. Or my favourite, a loyalist version of If You’re Irish, Come Into the Parlour – with the killer line, “but if your name is Timothy or Pat, you won’t get into the parlour with a Fenian name like that”. Ah, the joys of sectarianism. So, when he wrote, 'two songs from the stage' I was somewhere else entirely.
Perhaps that was a big part of the problem for my mother. This book was written two decades after we’d left home. But it still would have seemed like a world apart for her. Familiar in its hatreds, but also being seen through eyes that would also have seemed foreign to her – even if he was Irish, and so this should also have been ‘the place for you’ – and, if there is one thing very clear from reading this book, this was certainly not a welcoming place for someone from the South called Colm.
The bad blood runs deep in this book. My parents were heavily involved in politics when we left for our two-year trip to Australia. Shortly after we got here the Troubles started. My mother used to say she had no inkling that they were about to start. In the end, she could hardly believe they would ever come to an end. This book would help explain her pessimism.
Now, given all of that – I wasn’t rushing to read the book. But then, last week, I found it again and was curious to see what had upset her about it so much. Well, you know, other than the obvious, that it is about the insane hatred between Catholics and Protestants that my mother had spent a lifetime opposed to, organising against and trying to overcome even in her own family. My lifelong disgust at racism is perhaps the greatest gift I received from my parents. I was expecting something truly horrible to happen in this book – and so I was a bit disappointed, or not disappointed so much as confused. I wish I’d read it at the time, I’d have loved to have known what had upset my mum about it so much. But I left that one far too late.
Basically, this is a book about Colm walking the border between North and South – making his way through towns of very different loyalties. You forget when you live in Australia that accents mark you in places as small as Ireland in ways that they don’t in somewhere as big as Australia. No one here says, ‘I can do a Perth accent’ or ‘Don’t you love the Sydney accent’. When we first came to Australia people were really only familiar with a Dublin accent, and so they struggled to believe we were from Ireland – our accent was not at all like what they took an ‘Irish’ accent to be. There are times in this where Colm decides that the better part of valour is to keep his mouth well and truly shut.
I’ve often thought that I would like to do the Camino. My daughter did large parts of it a few years ago and I’ve always loved the idea of going on a very long walk that has been done by so many people over so many centuries. And I love the idea of a pilgrimage – even if I’m not at all religious. There is something about it all that I find very appealing. My daughter told me the worst part of doing the Camino was that you really didn’t get to see very many Spanish people at all – but rather lots and lots of American Christians who were there for an epiphany and made it very clear they weren’t particularly happy with the idea that my daughter was not religious. I’m not sure I could be bothered having to justify myself to bigots – so, perhaps the Camino is off the agenda. A pity.
While I was reading this, Colm talks about a kind of pilgrimage he goes on – to an island where you spend days not sleeping and barely eating and walking about the place saying various prayers. When he started talking about this, I thought, oh, that might be an interesting thing to do. I’d have to learn the Hail Mary and things like that first, I guess, but it would be something of an experience. That feeling of curious possibility lasted for perhaps a page. I didn’t mind so much that the food was god-awful. All part of the redemptive experience, I figured – but the excessive boredom he describes put me off it entirely.
One of the things I found most interesting about this – and something that I’ve noticed about Irish people more generally – is that we are often taken to be a very gregarious people, people who will talk to you for hours at the local pub and share their entire lives with you. Except, what they share hides as much as it displays. Being Irish himself, this is a book showing this reticence as much as anything else. Men who were there when they lost friends to the Troubles and had never spoken about it to anyone since. This is a big theme in his novels too, of course. As my daughter said about Brooklyn and Long Island – why the hell don’t they just come out and say it? Why all the secrets? Why indeed.
The part of this that reminded me most of my mother was a part I misread. It went like this:
“He had a good singing voice and was known particularly for his rendering of ‘Danny Boy’. He was nicknamed ‘Danny’. On 14 May 1977 he went to The Three Steps Inn which that night was packed with local people. He sang two songs from the stage.”
A few times in this, Colm talks of going into pubs and listening to Irish folk music. I was raised on Irish folk music. But my mother always contrasted this with what she called American Irish songs (think MacNamara’s Band) or what she sometimes called Stage Irish. She would sometimes sing rude versions of these she’d learnt as a girl on the streets of Belfast. Or my favourite, a loyalist version of If You’re Irish, Come Into the Parlour – with the killer line, “but if your name is Timothy or Pat, you won’t get into the parlour with a Fenian name like that”. Ah, the joys of sectarianism. So, when he wrote, 'two songs from the stage' I was somewhere else entirely.
Perhaps that was a big part of the problem for my mother. This book was written two decades after we’d left home. But it still would have seemed like a world apart for her. Familiar in its hatreds, but also being seen through eyes that would also have seemed foreign to her – even if he was Irish, and so this should also have been ‘the place for you’ – and, if there is one thing very clear from reading this book, this was certainly not a welcoming place for someone from the South called Colm.
The bad blood runs deep in this book. My parents were heavily involved in politics when we left for our two-year trip to Australia. Shortly after we got here the Troubles started. My mother used to say she had no inkling that they were about to start. In the end, she could hardly believe they would ever come to an end. This book would help explain her pessimism.
June 25, 2026
I can't remember how this book came across my awareness, though I have recently added Long Island to my reading list, so maybe it popped up somehow related to that - but certainly when it did, I ordered it from Abebooks and read it immediately. The book is set in the summer of 1986, around the time that I, as a twenty three year old, was solo travelling through Ireland and visited Belfast to see for myself what my father had been so adamant about. So roughly July-September 1986, Colm Toibin who was a 31 year old journalist, yet to publish any of his Booker Prize nominated novels, walked the border between the North and South of Ireland, with an aim to write a piece of social and political journalism in the face of the first set of concessions offered by the British Government.
The war, quaintly or perhaps ironically named "The Troubles", between the Nationalist forces of the IRA and the British Government, had been going on for about 20 years, and approximately 2,400 people of the eventual 3,500 had died in the bombing, assassinations, retaliations, disappearances, and state perpetrated violence. In the early 1980s, the political prisoners in Long Kesh had battled the Thatcher Government through their hunger strikes, resulting in the death of 10 men. By the mid-1980's the Thatcher Government had negotiated a political agreement called the Anglo-Irish Agreement, that opened the way for the Irish Government to have some advisory role in the Northern Ireland's government. Side note - you might like to listen to the podcast Gunplot, which documents the Irish Government's covert attempts in the 1970s to get guns to the IRA in Northern Ireland. History tells us that the Anglo-Irish Agreement did not bring about an end to the war, that would not officially happen until thirteen years later in 1998 when the Belfast Agreement, known as the Good Friday Agreement, was signed. Instead it was a milestone, on the way towards peace. It was deeply unpopular on the unionist side, largely because they had been excluded from the negotiations, and Colm Toibin articulates his feeling of dread associated with his walking project.
As a journalist, Colm Toibin was curious to walk along the border, staying in pubs and bed and breakfasts, going to folk music festivals, interviewing people on both sides who had been in close contact with recent atrocities, and periodically breaking the walk to travel to specific places where 'events' took place, like 12 July 'The Twelfth' for Orangemen parades and 12 August for the 'Apprentice Boys of Derry' march. This book is not an explicit piece of political analysis. Instead it is of the show don't tell genre. He writes what he sees and experiences and from that we learn about the people and their experiences, and their politics.
The book is minus any logistical framework for the travel, no explanatory information or motivation are provided but it becomes apparent as you read through the book that this is not some kind of lone person on a camino-like pilgrimage, but rather a carefully planned, timed and organised event. While written as a travelogue with a physical start and finish (Derry to Newry), it makes sure the narrative covers aspects of the Catholic Church (self-mortification rituals at Lough Derg, the failure of the divorce referendum), the importance of Irish folk music to national identity (the Fleadh Ceoil at Ballyshannon), the deeply ingrained systemic poverty experienced by the Catholics in the north (Hiring Fairs and good farm land in Protestant hands), the residual outstanding wealth of the Protestant aristocracy (Lord Brookeborough at Colebroke, the Maddens at Hilton Park, and the Leslies at Castle Leslie), and the economic consequences of the border (smuggling, economic decay of towns where bridges connecting north and south have been bombed or barricaded).
I particularly enjoyed the literary aspects of the trip - where Colm Toibin meets and introduces us to Annaghmakerrig - the Tyrone Guthrie centre for artists and writers, Bernard Loughin, its first director, the writers John McGahern & Seamus Heaney who are at a poetry event in Enniskillen, and Eugene McCabe who writes a deeply prescient novel of a local UDR man's assassination. He also, of course, references many other writers, not met, but still part of the landscape of Ireland and Northern Ireland (Wilde and Beckett went to school at Enniskillen - Portora Royal School, Patrick Kavanagh - Monaghan poet, Louise MacNiece - Belfast poet).
By far though, the most significant part of the narrative are the war zone stories. I remember travelling into Belfast on roads of much better standard than those in the South, but needing to go through army checkpoints and, if wanting to enter a hotel, I might be required to walk through metal detectors and scrutiny that I had only ever experienced at airports, checking for bombs and weapons. Nothing dangerous happened on my visit, in fact as so many people experienced during the war, life just went on, but it was a war zone, that much was apparent.
In Bad Blood, Colm Toibin arranges to interview people who had experienced either their own lives under threat, or the death of their loved ones. From Enniskillen through to Newry there are tales of the systematic targeting of protestants for killing by the IRA, with one family having three of the four brothers killed over an extended period of time. There are the constant overflying of the helicopters all along this part of the border, and the British army posts commandeering Irish land with the intention to "stay as long as the border stays". The army, initially deployed in 1969, peaks in 1972 with nearly 26,000 military personnel, is well and truely entrenched along the border in 1986, declines significantly after 1998 but isn't fully removed until 2007.
This is a slim book, with only 193 pages, and easily read. I have a personal fascination with the history of Ireland, as my ancestors are from Derry, and I spent 6 months there in the 1980s, so it was particularly poignant to me. I do recommend it to anyone who likes Colm Toibin's books or who has an interest in Irish Political History.
The war, quaintly or perhaps ironically named "The Troubles", between the Nationalist forces of the IRA and the British Government, had been going on for about 20 years, and approximately 2,400 people of the eventual 3,500 had died in the bombing, assassinations, retaliations, disappearances, and state perpetrated violence. In the early 1980s, the political prisoners in Long Kesh had battled the Thatcher Government through their hunger strikes, resulting in the death of 10 men. By the mid-1980's the Thatcher Government had negotiated a political agreement called the Anglo-Irish Agreement, that opened the way for the Irish Government to have some advisory role in the Northern Ireland's government. Side note - you might like to listen to the podcast Gunplot, which documents the Irish Government's covert attempts in the 1970s to get guns to the IRA in Northern Ireland. History tells us that the Anglo-Irish Agreement did not bring about an end to the war, that would not officially happen until thirteen years later in 1998 when the Belfast Agreement, known as the Good Friday Agreement, was signed. Instead it was a milestone, on the way towards peace. It was deeply unpopular on the unionist side, largely because they had been excluded from the negotiations, and Colm Toibin articulates his feeling of dread associated with his walking project.
As a journalist, Colm Toibin was curious to walk along the border, staying in pubs and bed and breakfasts, going to folk music festivals, interviewing people on both sides who had been in close contact with recent atrocities, and periodically breaking the walk to travel to specific places where 'events' took place, like 12 July 'The Twelfth' for Orangemen parades and 12 August for the 'Apprentice Boys of Derry' march. This book is not an explicit piece of political analysis. Instead it is of the show don't tell genre. He writes what he sees and experiences and from that we learn about the people and their experiences, and their politics.
The book is minus any logistical framework for the travel, no explanatory information or motivation are provided but it becomes apparent as you read through the book that this is not some kind of lone person on a camino-like pilgrimage, but rather a carefully planned, timed and organised event. While written as a travelogue with a physical start and finish (Derry to Newry), it makes sure the narrative covers aspects of the Catholic Church (self-mortification rituals at Lough Derg, the failure of the divorce referendum), the importance of Irish folk music to national identity (the Fleadh Ceoil at Ballyshannon), the deeply ingrained systemic poverty experienced by the Catholics in the north (Hiring Fairs and good farm land in Protestant hands), the residual outstanding wealth of the Protestant aristocracy (Lord Brookeborough at Colebroke, the Maddens at Hilton Park, and the Leslies at Castle Leslie), and the economic consequences of the border (smuggling, economic decay of towns where bridges connecting north and south have been bombed or barricaded).
I particularly enjoyed the literary aspects of the trip - where Colm Toibin meets and introduces us to Annaghmakerrig - the Tyrone Guthrie centre for artists and writers, Bernard Loughin, its first director, the writers John McGahern & Seamus Heaney who are at a poetry event in Enniskillen, and Eugene McCabe who writes a deeply prescient novel of a local UDR man's assassination. He also, of course, references many other writers, not met, but still part of the landscape of Ireland and Northern Ireland (Wilde and Beckett went to school at Enniskillen - Portora Royal School, Patrick Kavanagh - Monaghan poet, Louise MacNiece - Belfast poet).
By far though, the most significant part of the narrative are the war zone stories. I remember travelling into Belfast on roads of much better standard than those in the South, but needing to go through army checkpoints and, if wanting to enter a hotel, I might be required to walk through metal detectors and scrutiny that I had only ever experienced at airports, checking for bombs and weapons. Nothing dangerous happened on my visit, in fact as so many people experienced during the war, life just went on, but it was a war zone, that much was apparent.
In Bad Blood, Colm Toibin arranges to interview people who had experienced either their own lives under threat, or the death of their loved ones. From Enniskillen through to Newry there are tales of the systematic targeting of protestants for killing by the IRA, with one family having three of the four brothers killed over an extended period of time. There are the constant overflying of the helicopters all along this part of the border, and the British army posts commandeering Irish land with the intention to "stay as long as the border stays". The army, initially deployed in 1969, peaks in 1972 with nearly 26,000 military personnel, is well and truely entrenched along the border in 1986, declines significantly after 1998 but isn't fully removed until 2007.
This is a slim book, with only 193 pages, and easily read. I have a personal fascination with the history of Ireland, as my ancestors are from Derry, and I spent 6 months there in the 1980s, so it was particularly poignant to me. I do recommend it to anyone who likes Colm Toibin's books or who has an interest in Irish Political History.
February 12, 2026
Re-read of a book I bought in Cork in 2012 after doing my leaving cert. I'd forgotten most of this - except the dreariness of the long walks along country roads beneath a dull grey sky and the miserable summer weather (like summer 2012).
Very unique travelogue type of book. The beautiful natural scenery contrasts with the dreariness of the man-made border areas throughout and the very diverse range of characters interviewed/introduced makes the story so raw and tense. Kind of has a camino-type rythym as it moves from place to place and between different themes in each chapter.
Hard to believe anyone did this walk in 1985, it's a valuable insight of the time but you really are glad to return to the present after reading this.
Very unique travelogue type of book. The beautiful natural scenery contrasts with the dreariness of the man-made border areas throughout and the very diverse range of characters interviewed/introduced makes the story so raw and tense. Kind of has a camino-type rythym as it moves from place to place and between different themes in each chapter.
Hard to believe anyone did this walk in 1985, it's a valuable insight of the time but you really are glad to return to the present after reading this.
September 7, 2011
Toibin is my favorite writer, and this is not his best in terms of narrative, but it was a really unique reaction to the Anglo-Irish agreement. And he is such a good writer that I would read his observations about paint drying.
February 14, 2016
This is an excellent book, but those readers who may not know the intricacies of Irish political and religious history may be confused and have to do a lot of Googling as Toibin assumes you know already.
December 20, 2019
An excellent, thought provoking read.
April 26, 2020
Colm Toibin. Journal d'un voyage à pied réalisé dans les années 80 par le grand romancier irlandais. Plongée passionnante dans une région en plein conflit larvé.
June 2, 2017
Ireland has transformed since Colm Tóibín walked the border between the Republic and Northern Ireland in the aftermath of the Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985. In 1998, the Good Friday Agreement marked a watershed moment in the official peace talks and provided the framework for the devolved system of government present in the North. Political violence between Protestants and Catholics has decreased dramatically since the bloodshed of the seventies and eighties. All told, the border is a safer, more secure place than when Tóibín made his documentary pilgrimage that informed Bad Blood. These developments should be celebrated.
Nevertheless, it is impossible to understand Irish identity or twentieth century Irish history without reference to the Troubles, whose wounds have not been forgotten among the Irish. The sectarian violence propagated by the Provisional Irish Republican Army, the British Army, and the Ulster Volunteer Force scarred the country permanently and, in fact, experienced a resurgence of sorts when Tóibín wrote Bad Blood. Tóibín therefore helps the reader—whom, it should be noted, he assumes has a foundational familiarity with Irish history and politics—wrap her head around how, in an industrialized, developed, and otherwise stable western nation, petrol bombs and senseless murder wreaked havoc upon a mostly innocent population. His commentary draws heavily on the testimony of this population—Protestant and Catholic alike—who share with him their view of the conflict, their hopes, and their despair. “Protestants are being told that Catholics are the enemy. Catholics are being told that Protestants are the enemy,” a born-again minister from Darkley, whose congregation the Irish National Liberation Army once attacked, tells Tóibín. “The Devil is the enemy,” he concludes, evidently hopeful despite the deaths of three of his parishioners in that attack. Nearby, the words “Fuck the IRA” are written across the road. This is the kind of world Tóibín traverses on his pilgrimage.
Tóibín is an excellent observer. He hails from the South, lives in Dublin, and identifies as Catholic; still, he maintains an admirably neutral stance in his conversations with a myriad of disparate interviewees. He is friendly with a local Sinn Fein politician as well as the dispossessed descendants of Protestant landowners, now living in the servants’ quarters of their grandfathers’ Georgian mansions. He speaks with Catholic priests, Protestant presbyters, new-money capitalists, poor peasants, and survivors of terrorist attacks. The result is a fairly comprehensive view of the sociopolitical state of the border at this tense moment in history. To be sure, it is a grim portraiture.
Time and again, Tóibín reiterates how the Troubles have physically scarred the Irish landscape. Cement barriers with rusty metal spikes block once well-used roads. Bombs have destroyed the vast majority of border bridges, whose mere innards remain. In some instances, nature has literally consumed thoroughfares that cross the border. “At one point the road on the northern side had disappeared completely,” Tóibín writes. “The bog had folded over it, and it would never appear again, because it would never be needed again. The whole place was desolate now, depopulated, lonely; there wasn’t much need for these small roads.” Walls separate Protestant and Catholic communities. Watchtowers survey the nationalists in the fortified town of Crossmaglen. For Tóibín and his Irish compatriots, there is no end in sight. The future of their country is bleak—at least at that time, in those border communities.
While the end of the conflict, in the strict sense of that term, may still be in front of the Irish people, Bad Blood is now more of a historical document than a journalistic one. I do wonder what Tóibín makes of the book today, and I also wonder what the Irish people who live at the border make of their current situation. It is quite easy to visit Ireland without a second thought for the thousands of people murdered during the Troubles. Should she avoid Belfast, the uninformed tourist may never notice the vestiges of what had at one point seemed like interminable sectarian violence. For the American visitor, which is the only perspective from which I am comfortable writing on this issue, Bad Blood serves as a corrective to such ignorance. While digging deeply, Tóibín treads lightly, and his simple, straightforward prose is well-suited to his austere subject.
Nevertheless, it is impossible to understand Irish identity or twentieth century Irish history without reference to the Troubles, whose wounds have not been forgotten among the Irish. The sectarian violence propagated by the Provisional Irish Republican Army, the British Army, and the Ulster Volunteer Force scarred the country permanently and, in fact, experienced a resurgence of sorts when Tóibín wrote Bad Blood. Tóibín therefore helps the reader—whom, it should be noted, he assumes has a foundational familiarity with Irish history and politics—wrap her head around how, in an industrialized, developed, and otherwise stable western nation, petrol bombs and senseless murder wreaked havoc upon a mostly innocent population. His commentary draws heavily on the testimony of this population—Protestant and Catholic alike—who share with him their view of the conflict, their hopes, and their despair. “Protestants are being told that Catholics are the enemy. Catholics are being told that Protestants are the enemy,” a born-again minister from Darkley, whose congregation the Irish National Liberation Army once attacked, tells Tóibín. “The Devil is the enemy,” he concludes, evidently hopeful despite the deaths of three of his parishioners in that attack. Nearby, the words “Fuck the IRA” are written across the road. This is the kind of world Tóibín traverses on his pilgrimage.
Tóibín is an excellent observer. He hails from the South, lives in Dublin, and identifies as Catholic; still, he maintains an admirably neutral stance in his conversations with a myriad of disparate interviewees. He is friendly with a local Sinn Fein politician as well as the dispossessed descendants of Protestant landowners, now living in the servants’ quarters of their grandfathers’ Georgian mansions. He speaks with Catholic priests, Protestant presbyters, new-money capitalists, poor peasants, and survivors of terrorist attacks. The result is a fairly comprehensive view of the sociopolitical state of the border at this tense moment in history. To be sure, it is a grim portraiture.
Time and again, Tóibín reiterates how the Troubles have physically scarred the Irish landscape. Cement barriers with rusty metal spikes block once well-used roads. Bombs have destroyed the vast majority of border bridges, whose mere innards remain. In some instances, nature has literally consumed thoroughfares that cross the border. “At one point the road on the northern side had disappeared completely,” Tóibín writes. “The bog had folded over it, and it would never appear again, because it would never be needed again. The whole place was desolate now, depopulated, lonely; there wasn’t much need for these small roads.” Walls separate Protestant and Catholic communities. Watchtowers survey the nationalists in the fortified town of Crossmaglen. For Tóibín and his Irish compatriots, there is no end in sight. The future of their country is bleak—at least at that time, in those border communities.
While the end of the conflict, in the strict sense of that term, may still be in front of the Irish people, Bad Blood is now more of a historical document than a journalistic one. I do wonder what Tóibín makes of the book today, and I also wonder what the Irish people who live at the border make of their current situation. It is quite easy to visit Ireland without a second thought for the thousands of people murdered during the Troubles. Should she avoid Belfast, the uninformed tourist may never notice the vestiges of what had at one point seemed like interminable sectarian violence. For the American visitor, which is the only perspective from which I am comfortable writing on this issue, Bad Blood serves as a corrective to such ignorance. While digging deeply, Tóibín treads lightly, and his simple, straightforward prose is well-suited to his austere subject.
October 21, 2025
I just finished Colm Tóibín’s Bad Blood: A Walk Along the Irish Border as part of my thesis research, and honestly it was a joy. A muddy, rain-soaked, thought-provoking joy.
The book begins on the Derry/Donegal border and follows Tóibín’s travels all the way down to South Armagh, where, if I’m being honest, ends a little abruptly (but more on that later). Written in a diary-style travelogue, Bad Blood captures the writer’s gentle ease with locals and his sharp, observant wit. His voice is warm and unpretentious, and there’s an irresistible curiosity in every encounter.
I particularly loved his jaunt to Lough Derg. His account of the pilgrimage had me chuckling, especially when he emerges from the austerity of penance straight into a hearty feed at a local pub. Tóibín clearly enjoys his food, and he writes about it with such gusto that you can almost taste the cooked breakfasts, spud dinners and soups. His habit of consoling himself with a chocolate bar whenever the rain wore him down was equally endearing, proof that even great writers have their guilty pleasures.
And what a feat his journey was! Someone really should have given him the keys to Enniskillen, Lifford, Clontibret, and Crossmaglen for trudging through such relentless mud and misery during a very contentious period of the Troubles. The signing of the Anglo-Irish agreement was a key theme. His access to local families on both sides of the divide was remarkable, and his even-handedness in hearing both communities’ stories gives the book a quiet power. One can only imagine what the locals thought when he turned up this well-spoken journalist from The Irish Times asking about land, loss, loyalty and a place to put his head for the night.
A deeply poignant takeaway was when he wrote about his lifelong friend Bernard Loughlin, the then director of the Tyrone Guthrie centre, who passed away in 2018. Loughlin appears several times in the book and often comes to the rescue of Toibin's when he needed a lift or a break from the border madness. His brief encounter with Sean Quinn is another gem particularly the moment Quinn muses that he finds the stock market “entertaining.” Little did he know how tragically prophetic those words would sound twenty years later.
The passages about the British Army are some of the most affecting. Tóibín captures not just their presence but the uneasy, simmering emotions that came with occupation. His reflections stirred something in me—a fresh understanding of the complexity of my own homeland, and the pain woven into its quiet fields and wet hedgerows (I know them well). At one point, he speaks to a man in Co. Monaghan lamenting how the town’s young people want to leave. That conversation hurt to read, because four decades later, little seems to have changed along the border (and the North in general) apart from the dismantled checkpoints. That’s what sectarianism and violence does to a place; it leaves a heaviness that takes generations to shake.
There’s also something quietly fascinating about Tóibín himself in this book. You sense a man already bound for literary greatness. He was only in his early 30s when he trundled along those sodden roads. His intellect, his artist friends, his ability to balance empathy and irony was captured magnificantly and you feel a great happiness for him knowing he has went on to become one of Ireland's prolific and much loved writers.
The final section, where he interviews Alan Black, the sole survivor of the Kingsmill Massacre, is deeply moving. But after that encounter, the book ends rather suddenly. I was left wishing for a few closing reflections, some sense of what it all meant to him. Perhaps that’s deliberate; perhaps the border, like the book, resists neat conclusions. Still, part of me longs for Tóibín to do a return to the border forty years on. What a documentary that would make? Haunting, humane, and filled with ghosts both living and gone. Although we think we could spare Toibin the misery of the long walk.
If you’re curious about border life, Irish identity, or simply enjoy travel writing with bite, humour, and heart, Bad Blood is a must-read. Tóibín walks through rain, mud, and history itself and somehow makes you feel like you are splashing in puddles with him every step of the way.
The book begins on the Derry/Donegal border and follows Tóibín’s travels all the way down to South Armagh, where, if I’m being honest, ends a little abruptly (but more on that later). Written in a diary-style travelogue, Bad Blood captures the writer’s gentle ease with locals and his sharp, observant wit. His voice is warm and unpretentious, and there’s an irresistible curiosity in every encounter.
I particularly loved his jaunt to Lough Derg. His account of the pilgrimage had me chuckling, especially when he emerges from the austerity of penance straight into a hearty feed at a local pub. Tóibín clearly enjoys his food, and he writes about it with such gusto that you can almost taste the cooked breakfasts, spud dinners and soups. His habit of consoling himself with a chocolate bar whenever the rain wore him down was equally endearing, proof that even great writers have their guilty pleasures.
And what a feat his journey was! Someone really should have given him the keys to Enniskillen, Lifford, Clontibret, and Crossmaglen for trudging through such relentless mud and misery during a very contentious period of the Troubles. The signing of the Anglo-Irish agreement was a key theme. His access to local families on both sides of the divide was remarkable, and his even-handedness in hearing both communities’ stories gives the book a quiet power. One can only imagine what the locals thought when he turned up this well-spoken journalist from The Irish Times asking about land, loss, loyalty and a place to put his head for the night.
A deeply poignant takeaway was when he wrote about his lifelong friend Bernard Loughlin, the then director of the Tyrone Guthrie centre, who passed away in 2018. Loughlin appears several times in the book and often comes to the rescue of Toibin's when he needed a lift or a break from the border madness. His brief encounter with Sean Quinn is another gem particularly the moment Quinn muses that he finds the stock market “entertaining.” Little did he know how tragically prophetic those words would sound twenty years later.
The passages about the British Army are some of the most affecting. Tóibín captures not just their presence but the uneasy, simmering emotions that came with occupation. His reflections stirred something in me—a fresh understanding of the complexity of my own homeland, and the pain woven into its quiet fields and wet hedgerows (I know them well). At one point, he speaks to a man in Co. Monaghan lamenting how the town’s young people want to leave. That conversation hurt to read, because four decades later, little seems to have changed along the border (and the North in general) apart from the dismantled checkpoints. That’s what sectarianism and violence does to a place; it leaves a heaviness that takes generations to shake.
There’s also something quietly fascinating about Tóibín himself in this book. You sense a man already bound for literary greatness. He was only in his early 30s when he trundled along those sodden roads. His intellect, his artist friends, his ability to balance empathy and irony was captured magnificantly and you feel a great happiness for him knowing he has went on to become one of Ireland's prolific and much loved writers.
The final section, where he interviews Alan Black, the sole survivor of the Kingsmill Massacre, is deeply moving. But after that encounter, the book ends rather suddenly. I was left wishing for a few closing reflections, some sense of what it all meant to him. Perhaps that’s deliberate; perhaps the border, like the book, resists neat conclusions. Still, part of me longs for Tóibín to do a return to the border forty years on. What a documentary that would make? Haunting, humane, and filled with ghosts both living and gone. Although we think we could spare Toibin the misery of the long walk.
If you’re curious about border life, Irish identity, or simply enjoy travel writing with bite, humour, and heart, Bad Blood is a must-read. Tóibín walks through rain, mud, and history itself and somehow makes you feel like you are splashing in puddles with him every step of the way.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 74 reviews