Is there any greater joy for a confessed readaholic than when a nice big box from Amazon arrives at the door? Only when said wonderful big box contains a book this reader has been anxiously awaiting for since the previous book in the series was published in 2005. So it was with much fan-girl glee that I pounced on the final book in Morgan Llywelyn's Irish Century series, 1999.
This book picks up where the previous one left off (in a most harrowing, nearly diabolical cliff-hanger) with Barry Halloran amidst the horrors of the events of Bloody Sunday 1972, when a peaceful civil rights protest turned into murder, riots and mayhem. It was an event that changed Ireland, it's fight for freedom, and every irishman forever. It brought back stirrings of the angry freedom fighter in Barry that he thought had gone when he left the IRA, and he struggles to deal with that, with the changing world around him and his place in it's history as Ireland faces the war cutely referred to as The Troubles.
As usual, Llywelyn blends richly researched history and those factual players with deeply resonant compelling characters of her own. This is what history lessons should be, but never were in school. Through her knack for understanding the motives, complicated feelings and social importance of various struggles as well as what makes the human heart most human, abstract political and social ideals can be brought to light and explored in fabulous, emotional story. I have learned more, felt more, understood more reading this series than any number of textbooks could ever explain.
I fell in love with Llywelyn's character Ned Halloran back in the first book, 1916, fell for his quick Irish wit, passion and intelligence, his idealism and convictions through the 1916 Easter Rising. Reading this book, meeting his grandson Barry reminded me much of him, that keen intelligence, poetic soul and struggle to find what is right amongst a world filled with so much wrong.
We follow the characters through the Troubles, never shrinking away from the atrocities, miscalculations, hate and heart on both sides. But we also get to see the changes in the Republic of Ireland over those twenty some years, the birth of "the celtic tiger" as a viable player in the world economy, and the changes that brings. We see the struggle of the people, the politicians, revolutionaries and regular joes to get past the hate and find a compromise, a peace that Ireland deserves but is still struggling to accomplish. Ending with the 1999 Good Friday Agreement wrapped up this beautiful saga with a ray of hope and happiness, lovely and fitting end to the Halloran's tale.
Rated: * * * * * excellent
Warning: war and violence
Laure
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