#ReadingIrelandMonth25 – Rosepoint Publishing

A little story to add to the Reading Ireland Month celebration and all things Irish, the #Begorrathon, an annual event hosted by Cathy at 746 Books.

I usually reprise my little Beans, Beans story for St Patrick’s Day, but if you’ve been following me awhile, you’ve seen it. So this year, I thought I’d bring back another old St Patrick’s Day story originally posted back in March, 2017.

Rockaway Beach Private Festival, Rockaway Beach OR

Logo courtesy FB Rockaway Pirate Festival page

Well, what in the world were we thinking? Driving an old Class A RV to the coast where I’d signed up for a craft booth to sell my grandfather’s books on Rockaway Beach, Oregon for a Pirate Festival. (Rockaway Beach is part of the Tillamook Coast, of course, Tillamook–famous for fabulous cheeses.)

One of the booth sales ladies in the Yuma Winter Craft Shows told me about the pirate festival in Oregon when I rented spaces during the winter in Arizona to sell my grandfather’s books. Several of his books talked about pirates, so I thought it sounded like a lot of fun and a great venue for his books and promptly put in my reservation for the following June. The dates coincided with our son’s birthday, born on the CE’s birthday. (Sadly, it appears the Festival has run into insurance problems and has had to cancel the last couple of years.)

But, hey, it’s the Oregon coast. Can you say R A I N? (and cold and wind)

Arriving in a downpour Friday evening, I was a little dismayed about the thought of trying to set up our display in the wind and rain on Saturday. I was prepared with boxes of my grandfather’s books, a treasure chest with trinkets, and pirate scarves. And, yeah, the RV was leaking.

Our costumed daughter got right into the whole scene and made braided hair strings (she even decorated Jack Sparrow’s look-alike with one), and we had other pirate-related gedunks.

It was a blustery day, the sun ducking in and out of clouds, but we were able to install our little booth. People were dressed in costumes, there was music and blunderbusses, but not a lot of sales.

To celebrate the birthdays, we found a special traditional Irish café and ordered a big pot of corned beef and cabbage. The lady there—SOOO gracious and generous—threw in soda bread for us all. (We bought a birthday cake and candles separately.)

Photo by Jean Grainger

So it is that I remember with fondness the soda bread, though I’ve not done so grand a job as the lady in Rockaway Beach. Just in case, however, that you also have a fondness for traditional Irish Soda Bread, I’ve attached a page containing a special family recipe from one of my favorite Irish authors, Jean Grainger, who just released Yesterday’s Paper, from the Knocknashee series. She posted this soda bread recipe several years ago in response to requests. Do yourself a favor and check out her book.

Have a safe and happy March 17!

Reading Ireland Month (or the #Begorrathon as it is affectionately known) will return for the tenth year in March 2025. This will be my fifth year. It is hosted by Cathy at 746 Books. Cathy is a supporter of everything Irish and a promoter of Irish culture. She has an amazing list on her page for suggestions of what to read and listen to. Check out her page and sign up!

If you post, tweet or use instagram, please use the hashtags #readingirelandmonth25 or #begorrathon25

I am slow this year putting together a list of reading material, but hoping to read several as well as listen to more. I am also looking for a movie to watch and will try to include a quick bit from Marc Gunn, my favorite musical Celt Father.

I jumped the gun and read Melanie Forde’s new novel, Guardian of the Crossroads and Carlene O’Connor’s novel You Have Gone Too Far in February, but you could still check them out.

In the meantime, consider this my first for the annual celebration, a novella, short, fast read by Maeve Binchy. The last one I read by this author was in March of 2023, A Week In Summer, a real short story.

Book Blurb:

Original short fiction by a beloved best-selling author on her best topic relationships. Charming novella from a masterful writer on the power of family secrets. Nan Ryan lives by herself at 14 Chestnut Road. When builders arrive to fix a deserted house next door, everyone expects the worst. But when the handsome workman looks to Nan to help unravel the mystery of the previous residents’ disappearance, a strange relationship develops. With family dynamics and crooked developers in the wings, things are about to get very messy…

My Review:

Written to promote adult literacy in Ireland, Binchy manages to develop engaging characters and wring as much emotion from them as possible in less than one hundred pages. Nan Ryan lives alone, her children with lives of their own, manage visits that are little more than welfare checks and then gone. Then a crew arrives to fix up the house next door that was deserted a couple years ago.

The foreman of the team, Derek Doyle, pops in for tea and as a relationship develops, Nan changes her family dynamics. The relationship between her three children has been somewhat strained. As her interest and activity in Derek develops, however, an interesting paradigm impacts all the characters.

And I applauded the change.

While I wasn’t too sure about the conclusion, it was a happy little ending, even if a bit fast and tidy. If you are a Binchy fan, you can read it on your commute home (unless you’re driving, of course).

Rosepoint Rating: Four Stars

Book Details:

Genre: Two-Hour Travel Short Reads, British & Irish Literary Fiction, Romance Literary Fiction
Publisher: GemmaMedia
ASIN: B002A7WVNU
Print Length: 93 pages
Publication Date: May 1, 2009
Source: Local Library

Title Link(s):

Amazon-US | Amazon-UK

The Author: Maeve Binchy was born in County Dublin and educated at the Holy Child convent in Killiney and at University College, Dublin. After a spell as a teacher she joined the IRISH TIMES. Her first novel, LIGHT A PENNY CANDLE, was published in 1982 and she went on to write over twenty books, all of them bestsellers. Several have been adapted for cinema and television, including TARA ROAD. Maeve Binchy received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the British Book Awards in 1999 and the Irish PEN/A.T. Cross award in 2007. In 2010 she was presented with the Bob Hughes Lifetime Achievement Award at the Bord Gáis Irish Book Awards by the President of Ireland. She was married to the writer and broadcaster Gordon Snell for 35 years, and died in 2012.