Memoirs from the worlds of sport, dancing, architecture, mental health, politics and PR

It’s all about remembering this week, with memoirs just published by all sorts of people from public arenas, sports to dancing, architecture to mental health, politics to PR and more.

Raised by the Zoo, Gerry Crieghton, Gill, €22.99

Gerry Creighton is the lovable red-haired zookeeper who features prominently in the RTÉ TV series, The Zoo. Yes, that guy! He knows everything there is to know about elephants, having minded them for 36 years. Dublin Zoo has morphed from a showcase of imprisoned exotic creatures to a world leader in animal and environmental conservation, and Gerry has played his part in that seismic change. A must for animal lovers.

Showbusiness with Blood, Eamon Carr, Lilliput, €18

As a child, Kells native and former Horslip Carr had a lung disease and spent many months in hospital. There, he dreamed of becoming a famous boxer. The boxing didn’t happen, although fame did. In this mix of top-tier journalism and personal testament, Carr has written a unique book about the sport he loves and its heroes, while squaring up to its shadier connections with crime and the inherent dangers in the ring. It’s exquisitely, passionately written.

Memoirs of a Wonky-Eyed Man, Jason Byrne, Gill, €22.99

Jason Byrne has produced this hilarious memoir about his father Paddy, ‘the man that didn’t give a bollix’. Tracing the author’s years from Leaving Cert to stumbling into comedy, Byrne was always heavily influenced by his father and reading this memoir, it’s easy to see why. Paddy Byrne, who spent his life working in Guinness, was a riot. This memoir has a gag on every page, and for those of us who loved and still miss our funny fathers, it’s a prescribed read.

Rough Beast, Máiría Cahill, Head of Zeus, €17.99

This book is both a hot potato and a harrowing read, not just about Cahill’s rape and sexual abuse by a senior IRA man, but about the consequences for Cahill, who eventually garnered vague apologies from the NI justice system and the Sinn Féin-IRA cabal, but nothing more, and radio silence since. Younger voters being promised affordable housing by Sinn Féin (yeah, right), and with no memory of the IRA’s savagery, should read this damning personal and political indictment.

Breaking the Heart Open, Tony Bates, Gill, €22.99

Well-known psychologist and founder of Jigsaw, Tony Bates looks back on a painful childhood due to the death of his infant brother. His own hospitalisation very soon afterwards left psychological wounds that took decades to heal. These experiences would shape a distinguished career in mental health, an area he feels is over-medicated and critically under-resourced. ‘Physician, heal thyself’ comes to mind in this story of one man’s emotional recovery and a lifetime spent in enabling the recovery of others. An extremely well-written and honest memoir.

Caution to the Wind, Terry Prone, Red Stripe Press, €22.50

Terry Prone is no fledgling author and neither is she a stranger to controversy, falling for a priest and later marrying him, an abhorrent ‘crime’ in holy aul’ Ireland. Even so, she worked for the Catholic Communications Centre before moving to the ultra-lucrative Carr Communications. The PR guru and eloquent social commentator can really tell a story and this she does in a sweeping narrative that’s brusque and unflinching.

Making it So: A Memoir, Patrick Stewart, Gallery, €24.99

The Star Trek commander of the Enterprise didn’t have a bathroom in his childhood home. This is just one of many reveals Stewart makes in his memoir. Another is how his father’s horrific violence left him with lifelong emotional scars. And yet another is the fact that his real love is for stage rather than camera. His writing is charming, his wit very dry, he kept many a soul (including mine) going during lockdowns with his Daily Sonnets online, and this is a feast of a memoir.

Rambling Man: My Life on the Road, Billy Connolly, Two Roads €35

While there are plenty of amusing stories here, this memoir is a paean to the wonder of travel rather than an extended Connolly standup routine. That said, if your love of travelling is anything like Connolly’s, you’ll lose yourself in this odyssey with a difference. It’s the world through Connolly’s eyes, always alert for the absurd, the exotic quirk, the joy of each new destination. It also offers an insight into the private individual and family man, whose mind is as sharp now as it ever was and whose thirst for the ridiculous is never slaked.

First Quarter, John Tuomey, Lilliput Press, €15

John Tuomey is one half of the multi-award-winning architectural practice O’Donnell + Tuomey, his business partner being his wife. Their projects include the Irish Film Institute, the Lyric Theatre in Belfast, the Glucksman Gallery in UCC and many other iconic buildings both here and abroad. This memoir of his childhood in Cobh, Drumshambo and Cooley, and subsequent early days as a student in Dublin, will resonate with those of us of a certain vintage who remember a quieter Ireland. There’s a dry wit about his writing, suggesting a man not averse to comedies big and small, and this slim but eloquent little volume gives the reader an insight into the man behind the innovative design.

Finucane & Me, John Clarke, Gill, €22.99

Probably my pick of the bunch and up for an Irish Book Award, this is the author's story of 40 years spent with a woman who was arguably Ireland’s best-loved broadcaster. Clarke travels from their early days when they were both married to other people, to their halcyon days in the Big House in Westmeath, to losing their little daughter to leukaemia and on to their orphanage project in South Africa, Clarke’s alcoholism and recovery, right up to Marian’s sudden death. It’s a searing piece of truth-telling and a testament to enduring love in good times and bad. I hope it wins the award. It should.

Footnotes

The An Post Irish Book Awards are unique, with voting not confined to an academy (of which yours truly is a member) but including the reading public. The deadline is 5pm on November 9 and it couldn’t be simpler, just log on to irishbookawards.ie/vote, register your name and email and then choose from the various categories. You don’t need to vote in each category, just the ones that interest you. And you might win a €100 book token, so there’s that…