The Last Storyteller: A Novel of Ireland
by Frank Delaney
3 stars
400 pages
Published
Feb. 7, 2012
by Random House
At first, I didn't think I was going to make it through this book (which I won in a First Reads giveaway), but there's something oddly compelling, darkly beautiful and exquisitely twisted about the book. I love all things Irish, but if you're looking for a story filled with rainbows, leprechauns and Darby O'Gill, this book is not the one for you. The story revolves around a man writing his memoirs to his 2 children, to be read after his death. As an 18-year-old, he falls in love with an older woman. Then the woman is stolen away by her family, never to be seen again.
The plot isn't so much a quest to find her as a search to find himself, with a healthy dose of Irish history, politics and legend interspersed within. Honestly, I looked forward to the retelling of the legends parts, because those parts shone some sunlight into such a melancholy story. But it's all so eloquently written and characters so fully fleshed out, it was hard not to finish. It's not a "page-tuner," no, not by any stretch of the imagination, but it is thought-provoking. I recommend.
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