City of Bohane A Novel

A blazingly original, wildly stylish, and pulpy debut novel Thirty or so years in the future. The once-great city of Bohane on the west coast of Ireland is on its knees, infested by vice and split along tribal lines. There are the posh parts of town, but it is in the slums and backstreets of Smoketown, the tower blocks of the North Rises, and the eerie bogs of the Big Nothin' that the city really lives. For years it has all been under the control of Logan Hartnett, the dapper godfather of the Hartnett Fancy gang. But there's trouble in the air. They say Hartnett's old nemesis is back in town; his trusted henchmen are getting ambitious; and his missus wants him to give it all up and go straight.

Kevin Barry was born in Limerick in 1969 and now lives in Dublin. His short fiction has appeared widely on both sides of the Atlantic, most recently in The New Yorker. City of Bohane is his first novel.

“[Barry’s] work is hilarious and unpredictable—and always brilliant.” —Roddy Doyle

“The best novel to come out of Ireland since Ulysses.” —Irvine Welsh

“What an unforgettably wonderful novel: hilarious, unique, utterly believable. It’s Joyce meets Anthony Burgess, and as funny as Flann O’Brien. We Kevin Barry fans have known for a while that he is a writer of rarest gifts, but this book is an electrifying masterpiece.” —Joseph O'Connor 

“Kevin Barry is the real thing, and nothing can stop him.” —David Guterson