Old God's Time

The book deals movingly with the issues around historic child sex abuse in the Catholic church in Ireland. Barry said his period as Laureate for Irish Fiction (2019–2021) stopped him from “thinking about himself” as a writer and gave him a sense of “a public role,” which ultimately opened the door to him taking on this enormously challenging subject matter.

The novel tells the story of retired policeman Tom Kettle, who is grappling with the darkness of his past. It is a beautifully written novel that keeps you hooked from start to finish. Barry skillfully conceives ways of telling the… show more.

I’m a huge fan of Sebastian Barry, so I couldn’t wait to read this. It’s about Tom Kettle, an Irish policeman, now retired and living by the sea. Barry has an extraordinary ability to write poetic prose and make it feel authentically colloquial.

I was swept up in the rich language, which, although telling a dark story, is threaded through with glimmers of humor that made me laugh aloud.

We are right inside the interior world of the protagonist, so his confusion and haunted memories feel like our own. I couldn’t put this down.

I’m not at all a weepy person, but this novel broke my heart in two different places and literally left me sobbing.

Tom Kettle is a retired Dublin detective trying to live a quiet life by the sea when a case from his past rears its horribly ugly face. Poor Tom is slowly descending into dementia and is not only losing parts of his memory but can no longer be sure of what he sees in front of him. Having experienced dementia in my own family, this aspect of the story stirred painful and poignant memories of my own.

What… show more.

I felt everything, and worried about everything, as Tom Kettle settled into ‘his sun-faded wicker chair in the dead centre of his living room, feet pointed towards the affecting murmurs of the sea, smoking his cigarillos,’ and then two men knocked on the door and disturbed the hard-won peace.

The story is a slow build, a rondo starting at the edge of a theme and returning again and again, closer and closer to its tragic centre. I know I’ll read it again.