8 Fascinating New Books That Are Set in Ireland

Check out this selection of fascinating books set in Ireland if you’re seeking for a literary way to honour St. Patrick’s Day! These 8 books range from intricately written historical fiction to suspenseful mysteries and are full of memorable characters, evocative settings, and excellent storytelling.

The Singularities

John Banville

A man with a borrowed name steps from a flashy red sports car—also borrowed—onto the estate of his youth. But all is not as it seems. There is a new family living in the drafty old house: the Godleys, descendants of the late, world-famous scientist Adam Godley, whose theory of existence threw the universe into chaos. And this mystery man, who has just completed a prison sentence, feels as if time has stopped, or was torn, or was opened in new and strange ways. He must now vie with the idiosyncratic Godley family, with their harried housekeeper who becomes his landlady, with the recently commissioned biographer of Godley Sr..

Release Date: October 25, 2022

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Seven Steeples

Sara Baume

It is the winter following the summer they met. A couple, Bell and Sigh, move into a remote house in the Irish countryside with their dogs. Both solitary with misanthropic tendencies, they leave the conventional lives stretched out before them to build another—one embedded in ritual, and away from the friends and family from whom they’ve drifted.

They arrive at their new home on a clear January day and look up to appraise the view. A mountain gently and unspectacularly ascends from the Atlantic, “as if it had accumulated stature over centuries.

Release Date: April 26, 2022

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Trespasses

Louise Kennedy

Amid daily reports of violence, Cushla lives a quiet life with her mother in a small town near Belfast. By day she teaches at a parochial school; at night she fills in at her family’s pub. There she meets Michael Agnew, a barrister who’s made a name for himself defending IRA members. Against her better judgment – Michael is not only Protestant but older, and married – Cushla lets herself get drawn in by him and his sophisticated world, and an affair ignites.

Then the father of a student is savagely beaten, setting in motion a chain reaction that will threaten everything, and everyone, Cushla most wants to protect.

Release Date: November 1, 2022

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Cruel Deeds

Catherine Kirwan

Finn Fitzpatrick and Mandy Breslin work at the same law firm but move in very different circles. Mandy is a member of the privileged senior partners’ clique. Finn keeps to herself. When Mandy’s body is found at an abandoned house, everyone at the firm is left reeling – but the partners move fast. If Mandy was involved in something that got her killed, they want to be the first to know.

As Finn investigates Mandy’s work, she finds herself drawn deeper into her dead colleague’s life, and soon discovers that Mandy wasn’t the only one with secrets. Will uncovering this web of lies put Finn at risk too?

Release Date: February 3, 2022

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The Colony

Audrey Magee

It is the summer of 1979. An English painter travels to a small island off the west coast of Ireland. Mr. Lloyd takes the last leg by currach, though boats with engines are available and he doesn’t much like the sea.

He wants the authentic experience, to be changed by this place, to let its quiet and light fill him, give him room to create. He doesn’t know that a Frenchman follows close behind. Jean-Pierre Masson has visited the island for many years, studying the language of those who make it their home. He is fiercely protective of their isolation, deems it essential to exploring his theories of language preservation and identity.

Release Date: May 17, 2022

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Perpetual Comedown

Declan Toohey

As a doctoral student at Trinity College Dublin, Darren Walton is trying to decode an elaborate conspiracy he stumbled across as an undergraduate. To do so he must locate an alternate Ireland named Camland, the existence of which is proven when he discovers a literary journal whose contents mirror his own past.

With proof of his wild theories, Darren is sure academic fame is imminent. But for this he is willing to sacrifice not just his sanity and physical safety, but also his relationships with the ones who love him most.

Release Date: February 13, 2023

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Close to Home

Michael Magee

Sean’s brother Anthony is a hard man. When they were kids their ma did her best to keep him out of trouble, but you can’t say anything to Anto. Sean was supposed to be different. He was supposed to leave and never come back.

But Sean does come back. Arriving home after university, he finds Anthony’s drinking is worse than ever. Meanwhile, the jobs in Belfast have vanished, Sean’s degree isn’t worth the paper it’s written on, and no one will give him the time of day. One night he loses control and assaults a stranger at a party, and everything is tipped into chaos. Close to Home witnesses the aftermath of that night.

Release Date: May 16, 2023

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Hotel 21

Senta Rich

Noelle is an efficient, friendly hotel cleaner—a model employee. Or so she’d have you think . . . trouble is, she can’t help but take little “souvenirs” from the rooms she cleans. Nothing of value—a lipstick, a hair clip, some tweezers. By the time the guest has noticed, she’s long gone. As Noelle begins work at her twenty-first hotel, she’s determined to last longer than her record of one month in the job. But then she meets her new colleagues. These women are real: they live lives full of happiness and worry, pain and joy. They make her wonder what it might be like to have true friends, people to stick round for—and someone to love. . . . Will they give her the courage to claim the life.

Release Date: May 16, 2023

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Tags: Literary Fiction