Search results for ""Author Roddy Doyle""

Introduced by bestselling author Roddy Doyle.Charles Darnay and Sydney Carton are alike in appearance, different in character and in love with the same woman. In the midst of the French Revolution, Darnay, who has fled to London to escape the cruelty of the French nobility, must return to Paris to rescue his servant from death. But he endangers his own life and is captured. Carton may be able to help, but will his resemblance be enough to save Darnay's life?Specially abridged for Puffin Classics.Also abridged for Puffin Classics David CopperfieldGreat Expectations

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"Riotously funny" - The Times "Brilliant" Irish Independent Gloriously silly comedy for children from Booker prize winner and bestselling Irish author, Roddy Doyle. Mr Mack's inventing career has got off to a bad start - he's been arrested! It's up to Jimmy, Robbie, Kayla and Rover the wonder-dog to: - Rescue Mr Mack from prison - Avoid the orphan catchers - Save the world from an army of stroppy slugs Will they succeed? There's only one way to find out... Look out for more cheeky runaway comedies starring the Mack family and Rover the wonder-dog: Rover Saves Christmas, and The Giggler Treatment. with very funny line illustrations throught PRAISE FOR THE GIGGLER TREATMENT "Packed full of bizarre humour, imagination and a whole lot of poo..." - The Bookseller "Roddy Doyle is a genius!" - J. K. Rowling

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"Riotously funny" - The Times "Brilliant" Irish Independent Gloriously silly comedy for children from Booker prize winner and bestselling Irish author, Roddy Doyle. This special edition includes THREE books - The Giggler Treatment, Rover Saves Christmas and The Meanwhile Adventures. Join Rover the wonder-dog and the eccentric but lovable Mack family as they get into one madcap adventure after the other! The poo is about to hit the shoe... If adults are mean to children, they get the Giggler Treatment. It's smelly. It's squishy. And it sticks to your shoe. But sometimes, just sometimes, the Gigglers make a mistake... Can Robbie, Kayla, Jimmy and Rover the dog come to Mr Mack's rescue before the poo hits the shoe? with very funny line illustrations throughout PRAISE FOR THE GIGGLER TREATMENT "Packed full of bizarre humour, imagination and a whole lot of poo..." - The Bookseller "Roddy Doyle is a genius!" - J. K. Rowling

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"Riotously funny" - The Times "Brilliant" Irish Independent Gloriously silly comedy for children from Booker prize winner and bestselling Irish author, Roddy Doyle. If adults are mean to children, they get the Giggler Treatment. It's smelly. It's squishy. And it sticks to your shoe. But sometimes, just sometimes, the Gigglers make a mistake... Can Robbie, Kayla, Jimmy and Rover the dog come to Mr Mack's rescue before the poo hits the shoe? Look out for more cheeky runaway comedies starring the Mack family and Rover the wonder-dog: Rover Saves Christmas, and The Meanwhile Adventures. with very funny line illustrations throught MORE PRAISE FOR THE GIGGLER TREATMENT "Packed full of bizarre humour" - The Bookseller "Roddy Doyle is a genius!" - J. K. Rowling

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A novel of mothers lost and found, "Wilderness" is part roaring adventure, part family drama - with a charm that's all Roddy Doyle's. While Tom and Johnny are on a husky safari in Finland, their half-sister Grainne stays behind to face the mother who abandoned her. But Tom and Johnny are too caught up in their adventure to think of home - until they find themselves lost in the snow, in a desperate struggle for survival...

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Meet Charlie Savage.Charlie is a middle-aged Dubliner with an indefatigable wife, an exasperated daughter, a drinking buddy who’s realised that he’s been a woman all along … Compiled here for the first time is a whole year’s worth of Roddy Doyle’s hilarious series for the Irish Independent. Giving a unique voice to the everyday, he draws a portrait of a man – funny, loyal, somewhat bewildered – trying to keep pace with the modern world (if his knees don’t give out first).SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOLLINGER EVERYMAN WODEHOUSE PRIZE FOR COMIC WRITING 2019'A delight from start to finish' Irish Mail on Sunday

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Two men meet for a pint in a Dublin pub...In 2012, Roddy Doyle showed us the world anew: through the back-and-forth of two Dublin pub-dwellers. They chewed the fat, set the world to rights, slagged each other unmercifully. And along the way, they chased the ebb and flow and stupidity of the year right to the bottom of their pints.Today, they're still at it - even over Zoom, if needs be. Collected for the first time, here is almost a decade's worth of elections and referendums, births and deaths, football, financial crashes, pandemics and the philosophical questions of life, as told through the wit and warmth of Roddy Doyle's comic genius.Includes: Two Pints, Two More Pints, Two for the Road - and, for the first time in print, Two Pints: The Play and The Zoom Pints

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Roddy Doyle's Booker Prize-winning novel describes the world of ten-year-old Paddy Clarke, growing up in Barrytown, north Dublin. From fun and adventure on the streets, boredom in the classroom to increasing isolation at home, "Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha" is the story of a boy who sees everything but understands less and less.

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Booker-Prize winner Roddy Doyle's spectacular return to his iconic heroine, Paula Spencer'The undisputed laureate of ordinary lives'SUNDAY TIMES'Brilliant...passionate, funny and humane'DAVID NICHOLLSAt sixty-six, Paula Spencer - mother, grandmother, widow, addict, survivor - is finally living her life. A job at the dry cleaners she enjoys, a man - Joe - with whom she shares what she wants, friends who see her for who she is, and four grown children, now with families and petty dramas the likes of which Paula could only have hoped for. Despite its ghosts, Paula has started to push her past aside.That is until Paula's eldest, Nicola, turns up on her doorstep. Independent, affluent, a loving wife and mother, a success - Nicola is suddenly determined to leave it all behind. Over the next few days, as Nicola gradually confides in Paula the secret that unleashed this moment of crisis, mother and daughter find them

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Booker-Prize winner Roddy Doyle's spectacular return to his iconic heroine, Paula SpencerThe undisputed laureate of ordinary lives'SUNDAY TIMESBrilliantpassionate, funny and humane'DAVID NICHOLLSAt sixty-six, Paula Spencer mother, grandmother, widow, addict, survivor is finally living her life. A job at the dry cleaners she enjoys, a man Joe with whom she shares what she wants, friends who see her for who she is, and four grown children, now with families and petty dramas the likes of which Paula could only have hoped for. Despite its ghosts, Paula has started to push her past aside.That is until Paula's eldest, Nicola, turns up on her doorstep. Independent, affluent, a loving wife and mother, a success Nicola is suddenly determined to leave it all behind. Over the next few days, as Nicola gradually confides in Paula the secret that unleashed this moment of crisis, mother and daughter find themselves unt

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Just moved into a new apartment, alone for the first time in years, Victor Forde goes every evening to Donnelly’s pub for a pint, a slow one. One evening his drink is interrupted. A man in shorts and a pink shirt brings over his pint and sits down. He seems to know Victor’s name and to remember him from school. Says his name is Fitzpatrick.Victor dislikes him on sight, dislikes too the memories that Fitzpatrick stirs up of five years being taught by the Christian Brothers.He prompts other memories too – of Rachel, his beautiful wife who became a celebrity, and of Victor’s own small claim to fame, as the man who says the unsayable on the radio.But it’s the memories of school, and of one particular Brother, that he cannot control - and which eventually threaten to destroy his sanity.

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Love and marriage, children and family, death and grief. Life touches everyone the same, but living under lockdown? It changes us alone.A man abroad wanders the stag-and-hen-strewn streets of Newcastle, as news of the virus at home asks him to question his next move. An exhausted nurse struggles to let go, having lost a much-loved patient in isolation. A middle-aged son, barred from his mother's funeral, wakes to an oncoming hangover of regret. Told with Doyle's signature warmth, wit and extraordinary eye for the richness that underpins the quiet of our lives, Life Without Children cuts to the heart of how we are all navigating loss, loneliness and the shifting of history underneath our feet.'Life Without Children is boldly exhilarating, with its revelations of quiet love and the sheer charm of the characters' voices' Sunday Times'Quietly devastating...shivers with emotion' Financial Times'In the stripping away of everyday anxieties, the virus reveals what matters most, those qualities that are always at the heart of Doyle's fiction: love and connection' Observer'Moving...and beautiful' Daily Mail

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Jimmy Rabbitte is unemployed and rapidly running out of money. His best friend Bimbo has been made redundant at the company where he has worked for many years. The two old friends are out of luck and out of options. That is, until Bimbo finds a dilapidated 'chipper van' and the pair decide to go into business...By the bestselling author of The Commitments and The Snapper, The Van is a tender tale of male friendship, swimming in grease and stained with ketchup.

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It's 1924, and New York is the centre of the universe. Henry Smart, on the run from Dublin, falls on his feet. He is a handsome man with a sandwich board, behind which he stashes hooch for the speakeasies of the Lower East Side. He catches the attention of the mobsters who run the district and soon there are eyes on his back and men in the shadows. It is time to leave, for another America...Chicago is wild and new, and newest of all is the music. Furious, wild, happy music played by a man with a trumpet and bleeding lips called Louis Armstrong. His music is everywhere, coming from every open door, every phonograph. But Armstrong is a prisoner of his colour; there are places a black man cannot go, things he cannot do. Armstrong needs a man, a white man, and the man he chooses is Henry Smart.

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Gloriously silly dog comedy from Booker prize winner and bestseller Roddy Doyle. It's Christmas eve and Rudolph's got the flu! Jimmy and Robbie Mack are so desperate for Christmas that they've left twenty-seven sandwiches out for Santa. But Rudolf is off sick and Santa's grounded the sleigh - with all the presents. Will the big day be cancelled? Or can Rover the wonder-dog come to the rescue? Illustrated with fun drawings throughout Look out for more cheeky runaway comedies starring the Mack family and Rover the wonder-dog: The Giggler Treatment and The Meanwhile Adventures. Hilarious story that makes the perfect for Christmas!

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From the Booker Prize winning author of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha and The Commitments: the story of an ordinary woman whose extraordinary character will stay with you long after reading.‘He loved me and he beat me. I loved him and I took it. It’s as simple as that’ Paula Spencer is thirty-nine, the mother of four and learning to live without Charlo, her violent, abusive husband. Paula’s started drinking more and dreaming more, taking herself back to her contented childhood and audacious teenage years. Everything was better then, not least the music, the soundtrack to her romance with Charlo. As the past floats by and mingles with the present Paula Spencer finds herself coming alive, in all her vulnerability and her strength. ‘Roddy Doyle's unsparing examination of a brutal marriage transcends the boundaries of class and nationhood’ The Times

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Meet the Rabbitte family, motley bunch of loveable ne'er-do-wells whose everyday purgatory is rich with hangovers, dogshit and dirty dishes. When the older sister announces her pregnancy, the family are forced to rally together and discover the strangeness of intimacy. But the question remains: which friend of the family is the father of Sharon's child?By the bestselling author of The Commitments, now a long-running West End stage show. 'Unstoppable fun. A big-hearted, big-night out' The Times

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Longlisted for the 2015 IMPAC Dublin Literary AwardJimmy Rabbitte is back.The man who invented the Commitments back in the eighties is now forty-seven, with a loving wife, four kids ... and bowel cancer. He isn’t dying, he thinks, but he might be.Jimmy still loves his music, and he still loves to hustle. On his path through Dublin he meets two of the Commitments – Outspan, whose own illness is probably terminal, and Imelda Quirk, still as gorgeous as ever. This warm, funny novel is about friendship and family, about facing death and opting for life.Includes the short story Jimmy Jazz

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Rover, canine star of The Giggler Treatment, Rover Saves Christmas and The Meanwhile Adventures is back!The BFB (Big Fat Baby) is missing!Can Rover the wonder dog and his little nephew Messi (who is actually very tidy) track her down?While Rover and co. are hot on the trail of the BFB, via Granny Mack's backpack, the post lady's basket and a plane bound for Africa, it looks like the Gigglers are about to run out of poo . . .And without an urgent delivery from Rover, how will they be able to give the Giggler Treatment to grumpy adults and help kids all over the country?In Rover and the Big Fat Baby, Rover returns for another adventure in this bestselling illustrated series by Booker Prize-winner Roddy Doyle.

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Barrytown, Dublin, has something to sing about. The Commitments are spreading the gospel of the soul. Ably managed by Jimmy Rabbitte, brilliantly coached by Joey 'The Lips' Fagan, their twin assault on Motown and Barrytown takes them by leaps and bounds from the parish hall to the steps of the studio door. But can The Commitments live up to their name?The bestselling book behind the long-running West End stage show. 'Unstoppable fun. A big-hearted, big-night out' The Times

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Two men meet for a pint in a Dublin pub. They chew the fat, set the world to rights, take the piss… They talk about their wives, their kids, their kids’ pets, their football teams and – this being Ireland in 2011–12 –about the euro, the crash, the presidential election, the Queen’s visit. But these men are not parochial or small-minded; one of them knows where to find the missing Colonel Gaddafi (he’s working as a cleaner at Dublin Airport); they worry about Greek debt, the IMF and the bondholders ( whatever they might be); in their fashion, they mourn the deaths of Whitney Houston, Donna Summer, Davy Jones and Robin Gibb; and they ask each other the really important questions like ‘Would you ever let yourself be digitally enhanced?’Inspired by a year’s worth of news, Two Pints distils the essence of Roddy Doyle’s comic genius. This book shares the concision of a collection of poems, and the timing of a virtuoso comedian.

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We last saw Henry Smart, his leg severed in an accident with a railway boxcar, crawl into the Utah desert to die - only to be discovered by John Ford, who's there shooting his latest Western. The Dead Republic opens in 1951. Henry is returning to Ireland for the first time since his escape in 1922. With him are the stars of Ford's latest film, John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara, and the famous director himself, who has tried to suck the soul out of Henry and turn it into Hollywood gold-dust.Ten years later Henry is in Dublin, working in Ratheen as a school caretaker. When he is caught in a bomb blast, he loses his leg for the second time. He is claimed as a hero, and before long Henry will discover he has other uses too, when the peace process begins in deadly secrecy...

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Born in the Dublin slums of 1901, his father a one-legged whorehouse bouncer and settler of scores, Henry Smart has to grow up fast. By the time he can walk he's out robbing and begging, often cold and always hungry, but a prince of the streets. By Easter Monday, 1916, he's fourteen years old and already six-foot-two, a soldier in the Irish Citizen Army. A year later he's ready to die for Ireland again, a rebel, a Fenian and a killer. With his father's wooden leg as his weapon, Henry becomes a Republican legend - one of Michael Collins' boys, a cop killer, an assassin on a stolen bike.

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Roddy Doyle was born in Dublin in 1958. He is the author of twelve acclaimed novels including The Commitments, The Snapper, The Van and Smile, two collections of short stories, and Rory & Ita, a memoir about his parents. He won the Booker Prize in 1993 for Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha.

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Roddy Doyle's 'brilliant' Brilliant is a wonderful, heartwarming middle grade tale of friendship and family.Gloria and Rayzer must save their Uncle Ben. The black dog has got him.At least, that's what they heard their granny say. And she says it's taken Dublin's funny bone too.As Uncle Ben’s Dublin business fails, it's clear to Gloria and Rayzer that something is wrong. He just isn’t his usual cheerful self. Gathering all their courage the children set out on a midnight quest to hunt down the Black Dog and chase it away.Gloria and Rayzer are really brave, but the black dog is really scary – and soon they realize that they can't fight it alone. Before long loads of other children are searching for it too, because the Black Dog is hounding lots of Dublin's adults. Together – and with the help of magical animals, birds and rodents – the children manage to corner the Black Dog . . . but will they have the courage and cleverness to destroy the frightening creature?

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'A profound examination of friendship, romantic confusion and mortality' John BoyneOne summer's evening, two men meet up in a Dublin restaurant. Old friends, now married and with grown-up children, their lives have taken seemingly similar paths. But Joe has a secret he has to tell Davy, and Davy a grief he wants to keep from Joe. Both are not the men they used to be. As two pints turns to three, then five, Davy and Joe set out to revisit the haunts of their youth. With the ghosts of Dublin entwining around them - the pubs, the parties, the broken hearts and bungled affairs - the men find themselves face-to-face with the realities of friendship.

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The next round in the beloved Two Pints series from the ever-brilliant, always hilarious imagination of bestselling author of The Commitments and Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha Two men meet for a pint - or three - in a Dublin pub. They chew the fat, set the world to rights and mourn friends gone: David Bowie, Prince, Princess Leia and Young Frankenstein. Around them the world of Brexit, Trump, and referendums storm, but some things - good things - never change. Inspired by the last five years of news, Roddy Doyle's Two for the Road offers a strong brew of Roddy Doyle's comic genius - to be downed in one riotous sitting, or savoured over, laugh after laugh.

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*A BBC BETWEEN THE COVERS BOOKER PRIZE GEM* WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE 1993Paddy Clarke is ten years old.Paddy Clarke lights fires. Paddy Clarke's name is written in wet cement all over Barrytown. Paddy Clarke's heroes are Father Damien (and the lepers), Geronimo and George Best. Paddy Clarke knows the exact moment to knock a dead scab from his knee. Paddy Clarke hates his brother Francis because that’s the rule. Paddy Clarke loves his Ma and Da, but it seems like they don't love each other, and Paddy wants to understand, but can't.

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In Paul Quarrington's favorite childhood recording, a boy fashions a banjo from a cigar box, pluckily sets off for a contest in the next town, and wins with a song that weaves in the sounds he hears along the way: a bluebird trilling, truck tires whining. Years later, a writer and musician himself, Quarrington is suddenly diagnosed with stage four lung cancer and begins to ponder the path his own life has taken and the music it's made along the way. Quarrington ruminates on the bands of his childhood; his restless youth, spent playing bass with a cult band; and his incarnation, in middle age, as rhythm guitarist and singer with the band Porkbelly Futures. From rock'n'roll to country and soul, he explores how songs are made, how they work, and why they affect us so deeply.

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THE PHENOMENAL MEMOIR OF A NATIONAL TREASUREAfter Kellie Harrington won gold at the Tokyo Olympics, the Irish public recognized her as not merely a sporting hero, but a deeply inspirational human being. Now, Kellie tells the story of her unlikely journey to the top, and of the many obstacles and setbacks she overcame along the way.Growing up in Dublin's north inner city, Kellie was in danger of going down the wrong path in life before she discovered boxing. The local boxing club was all-male and initially wouldn't let her join, but she persisted.She was not an overnight success. For years she struggled in international competition. At times she felt unsupported by the national boxing set-up. More than once she considered giving up the sport. But some spark of ambition and love for boxing kept her going, and gradually she made herself world class.Writing with Roddy Doyle, the award-winning author of The Commitments, Kellie tells the story of her unlikely rise to greatness and her continuing dedication to living a normal life - which has involved remaining an amateur boxer and keeping the job she loves, at a Dublin psychiatric hospital. She shares exceptionally vivid and revealing details about being a woman in a historically male sport, and about how she manages her body and her mind. It is a vastly inspiring look inside the life and psychology of a woman who is both brilliantly ordinary and utterly exceptional.

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INTRODUCTION BY RODDY DOYLE'He brought everyone down to earth, even the angels' LEONARD COHENCharles Bukowski is one of the greatest authors of the twentieth century. The autobiographical Ham on Rye is widely considered his finest novel. A classic of American literature, it offers powerful insight into his youth through the prism of his alter-ego Henry Chinaski, who grew up to be the legendary Hank Chinaski of Post Office and Factotum.

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Tá Danny Ó Murchú ag dul le bualadh lena dheartháir Jimmy. Ní fhaca siad a chéile le níos mó ná fiche bliain. Ar an mbealach chuig an gcruinniú, is cuimhin le Danny na tréimhsí maithe agus na drochthréimhsí, an spraoi agus na troideanna – agus an t-achrann mór amháin a scar iad. An dtroidfidh siad arís nó an mbeidh siad ina gcairde mar ba ghnáth leo a bheith? Níl a fhios ag Danny. Danny Murphy is going to meet his brother, Jimmy. They haven't seen each other in over twenty years. On the way to the meeting, Danny remembers the good times and the bad times, the fun and the fights - and the one big row that drove them apart. Will they fight again or will they become the friends they used to be? Danny doesn't know.

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Great Expectations is one of the best-loved stories of all time, reissued in Puffin Classics, bringing classic literature to each new generation.As a small boy at Joe Gargery's forge, Pip meets two people who will affect his whole life - an escaped convict he is forced to help, and the eccentric Miss Haversham, whose beautiful, cold-hearted ward Estella young Pip adores. But when a secret benefactor pays for him to go to London to become a gentleman, Pip never dreams he will meet the dreadful Magwitch again, nor just how wrong his expectations are.Lightly abridged for Puffin Classics.Also abridged for Puffin Classics:A Tale of Two CitiesDavid Copperfield

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We read because we want to experience lives and emotions beyond our own, to learn, to see with others’ eyes.The 32 is a celebration of working-class voices from the island of Ireland. Edited by award-winning novelist Paul McVeigh, this intimate and illuminating collection features memoir and essays from established and emerging Irish voices including Kevin Barry, Dermot Bolger, Roddy Doyle, Lisa McInerney, Lyra McKee and many more.Too often, working-class writers find that the hurdles they come up against are higher and harder to leap over than those faced by writers from more affluent backgrounds. As in Common People – an anthology of working-class writers edited by Kit de Waal and the inspiration behind this collection – The 32 sees writers who have made that leap reach back to give a helping hand to those coming up behind. Without these working-class voices, without the vital reflection of real lives or role models for working-class readers and writers, literature will be poorer. We will all be poorer.

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