Killoyle: An Irish Farce (Paperback)

~ (Author)
Key Phrases: appropriate death, Father Doyle, Spudorgan Hall, Emmet Power (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Back in its early days, one of the great joys of reading Spy magazine was wading through the funny footnotes printed in the margins. That same pleasure awaits in this hilarious Irish farce, a first novel that captures the absurdly comic spirits of Joyce and Beckett in its depiction of an Emerald Isle town peopled by some most peculiar folk, indeed. Wallowing in such gloomy, traditional Irish concerns as religious angst and too much booze, Boylan's wacky tale is deftly fleshed out with dense footnotes addressed directly to the reader?a clever technique that, in the hands of this skillful writer, helps provide for heaps of hearty laughter amid all the tears. You'll meet characters like would-be poet Milo Rogers and Wolfetone Grey, who makes anonymous phone calls exhorting people to believe in God. Highly recommended.?David Sowd, formerly with Stark Cty. Dist. Lib., Canton, Ohio
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

All of the Irish clich‚s--drink, religion, and more than a touch of blarney--strut their stuff in this satirical first novel that, mindful of the great native literary tradition, tries to amuse as well as dazzle. Set in Killoyle, a place as much obsessed with its growing relations with Europe as it once was with Britain, the story follows the lives of some of the town's finest citizens: Milo Rogers, the waiter and would-be poet; Patrick Murphy, the barman at Spudorgan Hall, the local hotel; Wolfetone Grey, in charge of the hotel's catering; Emmet Power, the hotel manager; Kathy Hickman, columnist for Glam, a women's magazine; Father Doyle, the parish priest; and Thomas ``the Greek'' Maher, a sleazy developer. As to be expected in farce, these lives intersect or connect in lively and improbable ways and, this being an Irish story, the humor is often rather dark. Lives and substance are wasted on alcohol, dreams are more vivid than reality, and real happiness seems at best unlikely. Plot is secondary to character, but there's enough to hold together a narrative obtrusively interrupted by jokey footnotes on almost every page. Among the events: The aging Father Doyle drinks to help him accept that he'll never revisit Rome, where he spent a happy year in his early priesthood; Maher schemes to increase his property holdings; Murphy is fired and becomes a terrorist; Milo is promoted, then begins a typically dilatory Irish courtship of the still lissome Kathy, who once posed for a British porn magazine; Wolfetone, obsessed with a religion whose adherents' names begin with G, goes mad; and Emmet Power and his wife find a pleasant billet running a Jesuit college in Italy. Poor Father Doyle, promised a post in Rome, dies before he can take it up. Despite the often strained humor, Boylan's debut succeeds as a work in which the telling is more important--and more beguiling- -than the tale. -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 248 pages
• Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press; First Paperback edition (May 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1564781453
• ISBN-13: 978-1564781451
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,476,790 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars no title, August 2, 2000

By A Customer

Brava, Mr. Boylan! It has been a long time since I read a book that made me laugh out loud, not just a titter here and there but frequent and hearty chuckles, chortles, and out and out belly laughs. Even rarer is the book that engages both your chortling mechanism and your mind. Killoyle does both. Slapstick and sophisticated simultaneously.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars oh, the footnotes!, November 12, 2000

By	Reader "piratebean" (Bristol, RI USA) - See all my reviews

Any book subtitled "An Irish Farce" is worth a thorough reading, and Killoyle was no disappointment. The story alternates between despair and hilarity - this is Ireland, after all - as it follows the lives of the inhabitants of Killoyle. Among many other folks, there is the aging editor of a glamour magazine, a waiter who is something of a poet, and the resident nutcase who likes making prank phone calls as much as he likes books by or about God. Of course, being a novel about Ireland, there are the requisite problems: drinking, sex, God, and Ireland itself.

The real genius of the novel is the footnotes, including gems like this one: "This round-buying will be the death of the Irish nation, you mark my words. Once I was conned into buying eleven rounds in the space of a single wet lunch, with no one else in the bar!" The persona of the footnotes provides comic relief, criticism, rude comments, and seemingly random filler throughout the text. However, from driving directions to snappy comebacks, the footnotes provide, as they should, the details that flesh out the story.

Besides being just plain fun to read, Killoyle is worth a look because Boylan rose to the challenge of doing something 'new' with the novel. I applaud him and his witty footnotes, and I highly recommend Killoyle if you are in the mood for a good yarn.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Irish Nabokov, March 26, 2002

By A Customer

Killoyle is a book to be savored -- if you try to rush through it, I don't think you'll enjoy it. Roger Boylan's style demands a thoughtful, reflective pace of reading.

I think of Boylan as an Irish Nabokov. Like Nabokov, he is a virtuoso of language who apparently writes for the pure pleasure of doing so. And what fun he seems to have! His unpredictable, spontaneous flashes of merriment keep the reader entertained throughout.

I found the uniquely Irish charm of Killoyle so delightful that I have gone on an Irish literature binge since reading it: Joyce, Beckett, and Flann O'Brien. I can't thank Roger Boylan enough!