God can sanctify photography. With a poem by Pope Leo XIII, Colin Ford explains the basis for how Irish Jesuit Frank Browne acquired a camera from his bishop uncle, at the age of 17, and kept making images throughout his priestly life. Browne took his camera everywhere. His early trips to Europe were the apparent … Continue reading Book review — Frank Browne: A Life through the Lens (David and Edwin DAVISON)
Reading this book was always going to have a special meaning to me, as my wife had a stroke about two years ago. Like James and Bev, my wife and I are writing a book together about our experience. We honestly came up with the same chapter layout as them — alternative narrations. In these types of … Continue reading Book review — Touching Distance (James Cracknell)
Somehow I escaped reading this essential school text, with its story of racism in 1930s American South. Living in Northern Ireland, I draw parallels with sectarianism, with its similar bigotry and prejudice. To Kill a Mockingbird was part of a Unite Against Hate campaign event at Parliament Buildings in Northern Ireland, which I've written about … Continue reading Book review – To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper LEE)
Tony Macaulay is a respected professional community relations and youth worker based in Belfast. For example, he has written independently, "A discussion paper proposing a five phase process for the removal of 'peace walls' in Northern Ireland". This book is his story of being a 12-year-old paperboy, living in the Shankill area of West … Continue reading Book review – Paperboy (Tony Macaulay)
I was once asked if I thought the Northern Ireland conflict was difficult to comprehend. Not really, I replied. What confounded me was that as so many people within Northern Ireland understood the various factors involved, why work towards any resolution took so long. Put another way, I found comprehending the geo-political situation of former … Continue reading Book review – Kosovo: What Everyone Needs to Know (Tim JUDAH)
Vince Cable is the chief economic spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats, and his lucid explanations of the credit crunch and overall current parlous global economic situation has seen him well sought after by mainstream news media outlets. For good reason -- his analysis has been proven spot on. In his book, The Storm: The World … Continue reading Book review – The Storm (Vince CABLE)
I always wanted this book, Eyewitness: Four Decades of Northern Life, by Brendan Murphy, but the original cover price of £30 was a little steep for me. Thankfully, the Bookshop at Queen's has it discounted to £8. I only had to wait 6 years. It is a brilliant book. Murphy's photographs may not be the … Continue reading Book review — Eyewitness (Brendan Murphy)
Book review: Ordinary Lives by Allan LEONARD for Shared Future News 8 January 2009 In recent years there has been an influx into Northern Ireland of new arrivals from east European countries, as well as more familiar western places of Portugal and Spain. The British Council organised the Ordinary Lives project, which explores stories of … Continue reading Book review – Ordinary Lives
Sophie Scholl and the White Rose (978-1851685363), by Annette Dumbach and Jud Newborn, is a superbly well researched and presented account of an act of honour and bravery by conscientious young German students, who dared to stand up against the mind numbing machine of Nazism and the Nationalist Socialist movement during World War II. In 1989, I visited an exhibition … Continue reading Book review – Sophie Scholl and the White Rose
Michael Faulkner, son of Brian, loses his Sante Fe style furniture business and home in Scotland. Retreats to family cabin on an otherwise uninhabited small island in Strangford Lough, Ards Peninsula, Northern Ireland. This is reading through a couple's challenging times, that part of the wedding vows that read, "for better or worse". There are plenty of happy … Continue reading Book review – The Blue Cabin (Michael FAULKNER)
I had the privilege of participating in a study abroad programme while enrolled at Boston University. I attended St Catherine's College, Oxford for the Michaelmus term, 1989. I experienced the peculiarities and uniqueness that is Oxford. No one describes this better than Rosa Ehrenreich in A Garden of Paper Flowers. I immediately identified with her reactions to the arcane customs, traditions … Continue reading Book review – A Garden of Paper Flowers (Rosa EHRENREICH)
There's no denying the fighting spirit of the Scots-Irish, particularly as James Webb describes the defence of the frontier in the Appalachian Mountains. However, Webb goes too far in defining this attribute as somehow ethnically unique. Webb also overplays the Scots-Irish role in the American War of Independence. One giveaway passage is, "Although the trained minds of New England's Puritan culture … Continue reading Book review – Born Fighting (James WEBB)
