I had a really tough time believing every female in the town of Mulderrig found Mahoney so irresistible.

Himself by Jess Kidd review – a dark and rollicking debut

They are always with him and his world is full of ghost-girls and transparent animals, bodies dangling from the branches of trees with their necks stretched out of shape.

Every page of Kidd’s who-done-it novel is filled with magic, spirit, peppery characters, and ghosts of the village dead, including their pets, who are visible only to some. A rage so powerful that the woman realises that this rage, in the form of the man’s fists pummelling into her head, will take her life.

Jess Kidd - Book Series In Order Jess Kidd - Book Series In Order

It is also the catalyst for the dead, whom only he can see, to rise and swell the population of the village – most poignantly the ghost of six-year-old Ida, who lost her yo-yo in the forest, saw something she wasn’t supposed to see, and was dispatched with a shovel to the back of the head by Orla’s murderer. What he does to the female population of Mulderrig, a small town in County Mayo Ireland, is amazing:) I am pretty sure he has charmed many of the readers of this book, including me. He has a photograph of her, where she’s holding him as an infant, given to him as he was leaving the Orphanage. Everywhere he goes, the ghosts of the dead, human and animal, tumble out all around him, on occasion to help him.The humour is Guinness-dark and spiteful; there is a splendid scene towards the end where Annie Farrell, the Black Widow, is attempting to smother Mrs Cauley with a pillow, when she is assailed by flying novels from the old lady's magical library. Poisoned scones, letter bombs, a hero who sees dead people and a 1970s Irish village desperate to maintain its pious facade: the ingredients for mystery and drama are all present early in Jess Kidd's debut novel. Tadhg is propping up the saloon door of Kerrigan’s Bar having changed a difficult barrel and threatened a cellar rat with his deadly tongue.

Himself by Jess Kidd | Waterstones

This reading group guide for Himself includes an introduction, discussion questions, and ideas for enhancing your book club. Lastly, my biggest concern was combination of the lyricism and magic realism that too frequently tip over into Irish whimsy. Lovable car thief and Dublin charmer Mahony had always been told he was left on the steps of an orphanage as a baby. A spectacular new addition to the grand Irish storytelling tradition by an author with “an imagination to die for” ( The Guardian), Himself “will bring tears to your sorry eyes and joy to your hardened heart” ( Milwaukee Journal Sentinel). Mrs Cauley’s idea to put Mahony centre stage in the lead role of the production is introduced and then largely forgotten after the auditions.His uncannily familiar face and outsider ways cause a stir among the locals, who receive him with a mixture of excitement (the women), curiosity (the men), and suspicion (the pious). He has a love affair that is pretty pointless to the plot, other than to show us yet again how studly he is. As well as the chorus of the dead, we have a “holy spring” that erupts through Father Quinn’s study floor, and a concomitant plague of frogs; a storm of soot enveloping the village; life-changing floods. Her bereaved mother is a fleeting romantic interest before the young, put-upon young landlady takes precedence.