Irish Non-Fiction

From medieval monks to recent renaissance, From Barley to Blarney: A Whiskey Lover's Guide to Ireland includes everything you need to understand, appreciate, and mix one of the world's fastest-growing (and most delicious!) spirits…

On the morning of 11 October 1921, the world’s media watched as Michael Collins, leader of the ‘Irish murder gang’, bounded through the door of 10 Downing Street. Moments later, he shook hands with the British Prime Minister. So b…

Ireland is the first country in the world to extend civil marriage to same sex couples through a public vote. The marriage equality referendum saw record numbers turn out to register their votes including Irish emigrants who retur…

Award-winning producer and journalist Daire Whelan had reached the end of another busy week and couldn't shake the feeling that life was passing him by too quickly. Vowing to make a change, he decided to commit to a year of fly fi…

Tales of passion and romance, love on the battlefield, affairs kept secret on pain of death ... From the bride who married in a prison cell, to the leader caught in a love triangle, to the revolutionaries who did their loving on t…

Nearly 2,000 people gave detailed statements to the Bureau of Military History between 1947 and 1957 about their role in Ireland's fight for freedom. The statements are the recollections of many of those who participated in the 19…

The perfect stocking filler for lovers of Irish Castles. A pocket-sized guide to around 140 of Ireland's most dramatic castles and strongholds, all of which are open to the public, with structures from across the whole island of I…

The perfect stocking filler for lovers of Irish Whiskey. This is an excellent introduction to the world of Irish whiskey, with descriptions of more than 100 whiskeys from the whole island of Ireland. Photographs of key locations a…

Over the course of fifteen years, John Delaney ran the Football Association of Ireland as his own personal fiefdom. He had his critics, but his power was never seriously challenged until last year, when Mark Tighe and Paul Rowan p…

First published in 1895, St. Multose Church Kinsale: As it was, and is, and ought to be was the work of the then rector of Kinsale, the Rev. John Lindsey Darling. It used detailed architectural drawings, sketches and photographs t…

The Coastal Atlas of Ireland is a celebration of Ireland's coastal and marine spaces. Drawing on written contributions from over 100 authors from across the island of Ireland and beyond, the Atlas takes an explicitly all-island ap…

Independence Memories is a fascinating social history, from living and inherited memory, of the period surrounding Irish Independence and the Civil War. It was a time of violence, of death, of emigration, of families divided into …

A compelling history of life on Cork City's northside for almost a century. Originally published in 1999 and now reprinted by public demand with added historical material and photographs, this book carries the reader on a journey …

All across Ireland, thousands of people are living in apartments and houses with serious fire safety and structural defects. Some of these have made the news, many more have not. Defects: Living with the Legacy of the Celtic Tiger…

Rosaleen McDonagh writes fearlessly about a diverse experience of being Irish. Unsettled explores racism, ableism, abuse and resistance as well as the bonds of community, family and friendship. As an Irish Traveller writing from a…

Why did the Romans never try to conquer Ireland? Why did the King of Spain give his name to an Irish county? And how did brandy change the course of Irish history? Turtle Bunbury explores unexpected corners of the past to offer an…

The blistering non-fiction debut from the author of the critically acclaimed A Girl is a Half-formed Thing 'A fearless, interrogative work that speaks so much to structural inequality and misogyny. A fierce and fascinating manifes…

On the morning of Saturday 22nd April 1978, members of an Active Service Unit of the IRA hijacked a car and crossed the countryside to the town of Lisburn. Within an hour, they had killed an off-duty policeman in front of his youn…

George Touchet, 11th Baron Audley and 1st Earl of Castlehaven was a leading English commander in the decisive Battle of Kinsale in which he was wounded. He later became one of Ireland’s largest landowners, possessing 200,000 acres…

Available for the first time in an updated, compact paperback format, this book offers a stunning photographic survey of Ireland over the last seven decades, from the 1950s to the present day. Organized decade by decade, the image…

On the streets of the tough Dublin inner-city neighbourhood where he grew up, Gerry Hutch was perceived as an ordinary decent criminal, a quintessential Robin Hood figure who fought the law - and won. To the rest of the world he w…

Proverbs in Irish grants the reader a look into the vast and rich world of aphoristic Irish folk-wisdom, as vibrant today as they were then. Chosen on the basis of relevance in the modern context, universality, frequency of usage,…

As every sportsperson knows, the dream can't go on forever. After years of dedication, sacrifice and single-minded obsession to get to the top, one day it all has to end. When the World Stops Watching tells the real inside stories…

'Sensational! John Connell has done it again' - Dean Karnazes From the award-winning, No.1 bestselling author of The Cow BookIn The Running Book, John Connell vividly describes a marathon through County Longford, Ireland, where he…

Discover the fascinating world of Ireland's diverse and astonishing collection of native wildflowers. This new edition reflects the many changes to our botanical knowledge since The Wildflowers of Ireland was first published in 20…

Lloyd George boasted that he had “murder by the throat” in a London Guildhall speech on 10 November 1920.  He had flooded Ireland with troops, Black and Tans, Auxiliaries, secret service, touts and informers.  Eighteen months late…

On a sunlit evening in l882, Lord Frederick Cavendish and Thomas Burke, Chief Secretary and Undersecretary for Ireland, were ambushed and stabbed to death while strolling through Phoenix Park in Dublin. The murders were carried ou…

The groundbreaking two-term President of Ireland tells the stories of her life. When a young Mary McAleese told a priest that she planned to become a lawyer, the priest dismissed the idea: she knew no one in the law, and she was f…

The untold stories of some of the men and women of County Kerry who gave their all in Ireland's fight for independence. In Fighting for the Cause well-known Kerry historian Dr Tim Horgan tells the stories of some of the Kingdom's …

This is the story of life in Ireland--a story half a billion years in the making. With its castles, crannogs, and passage tombs, Ireland is a land where history looms large, but the saga of life on this island dates back millions …