4.0
Say Nothing
ByPublisher Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NOW AN FX LIMITED SERIES STREAMING ON HULU • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER • From the author of Empire of Pain—a stunning, intricate narrative about a notorious killing in Northern Ireland and its devastating repercussions.
One of The New York Times’s 20 Best Books of the 21st Century • A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Century • A Los Angeles Times Best Nonfiction Book of the Last 30 Years
"Masked intruders dragged Jean McConville, a 38-year-old widow and mother of 10, from her Belfast home in 1972. In this meticulously reported book—as finely paced as a novel—Keefe uses McConville's murder as a prism to tell the history of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Interviewing people on both sides of the conflict, he transforms the tragic damage and waste of the era into a searing, utterly gripping saga." —New York Times Book Review
"Reads like a novel. . . . Keefe is . . . a master of narrative nonfiction. . . . An incredible story."—Rolling Stone
A Best Book of the Year: The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, TIME, NPR, and more!
Jean McConville's abduction was one of the most notorious episodes of the vicious conflict known as The Troubles. Everyone in the neighborhood knew the I.R.A. was responsible. But in a climate of fear and paranoia, no one would speak of it. In 2003, five years after an accord brought an uneasy peace to Northern Ireland, a set of human bones was discovered on a beach. McConville's children knew it was their mother when they were told a blue safety pin was attached to the dress--with so many kids, she had always kept it handy for diapers or ripped clothes.
Patrick Radden Keefe's mesmerizing book on the bitter conflict in Northern Ireland and its aftermath uses the McConville case as a starting point for the tale of a society wracked by a violent guerrilla war, a war whose consequences have never been reckoned with. The brutal violence seared not only people like the McConville children, but also I.R.A. members embittered by a peace that fell far short of the goal of a united Ireland, and left them wondering whether the killings they committed were not justified acts of war, but simple murders.
From radical and impetuous I.R.A. terrorists such as Dolours Price, who, when she was barely out of her teens, was already planting bombs in London and targeting informers for execution, to the ferocious I.R.A. mastermind known as The Dark, to the spy games and dirty schemes of the British Army, to Gerry Adams, who negotiated the peace but betrayed his hardcore comrades by denying his I.R.A. past--Say Nothing conjures a world of passion, betrayal, vengeance, and anguish.
One of The New York Times’s 20 Best Books of the 21st Century • A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Century • A Los Angeles Times Best Nonfiction Book of the Last 30 Years
"Masked intruders dragged Jean McConville, a 38-year-old widow and mother of 10, from her Belfast home in 1972. In this meticulously reported book—as finely paced as a novel—Keefe uses McConville's murder as a prism to tell the history of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Interviewing people on both sides of the conflict, he transforms the tragic damage and waste of the era into a searing, utterly gripping saga." —New York Times Book Review
"Reads like a novel. . . . Keefe is . . . a master of narrative nonfiction. . . . An incredible story."—Rolling Stone
A Best Book of the Year: The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, TIME, NPR, and more!
Jean McConville's abduction was one of the most notorious episodes of the vicious conflict known as The Troubles. Everyone in the neighborhood knew the I.R.A. was responsible. But in a climate of fear and paranoia, no one would speak of it. In 2003, five years after an accord brought an uneasy peace to Northern Ireland, a set of human bones was discovered on a beach. McConville's children knew it was their mother when they were told a blue safety pin was attached to the dress--with so many kids, she had always kept it handy for diapers or ripped clothes.
Patrick Radden Keefe's mesmerizing book on the bitter conflict in Northern Ireland and its aftermath uses the McConville case as a starting point for the tale of a society wracked by a violent guerrilla war, a war whose consequences have never been reckoned with. The brutal violence seared not only people like the McConville children, but also I.R.A. members embittered by a peace that fell far short of the goal of a united Ireland, and left them wondering whether the killings they committed were not justified acts of war, but simple murders.
From radical and impetuous I.R.A. terrorists such as Dolours Price, who, when she was barely out of her teens, was already planting bombs in London and targeting informers for execution, to the ferocious I.R.A. mastermind known as The Dark, to the spy games and dirty schemes of the British Army, to Gerry Adams, who negotiated the peace but betrayed his hardcore comrades by denying his I.R.A. past--Say Nothing conjures a world of passion, betrayal, vengeance, and anguish.
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Meet readers like you in the Fable For You feed, designed to build bookish communitiesSay Nothing Reviews
4.0
“After visiting Dublin I really wanted to learn more about the history of Northern Ireland from an unbiased perspective. I absolutely loved the way this book was written; I’m not usually one for history books, but the narrative used to build on the historic events and those involved during the Troubles, and even more recently, pulls you in wanting to read and know more and more. A must read!!!! Thank you Tamara for getting me onto this one!!”
“I've never been much of a history buff. This is the second history book that I've read this year (the first being "Killers of the Flower Moon"). I found both reading experiences to be so rewarding that I've set a goal to read two more history books by the end of this year.
The story of the abduction and "disappearing" of Jean McConville serves as the main narrative thread through the book. In the early chapters, it's easy to lose track of that thread, as the story seems to go wildly in different directions, following different figures from throughout the Troubles. But by the end of the book all of the threads are brought together in a very satisfying and enlightening way.
This book is also a meditation on the nature of political violence and how people grapple with committing political violence both while in the midst of it and in the years after the conflict has subsided. That humanity is what really brought this book to life for me, and it's why I want to carry on reading read more history.”
“I did not know much about this subject. It was well written and kept my attention. Written almost like a novel but non fiction.”
“I highly recommend to anyone who wants to learn about the history of the Troubles. The storytelling is great, so even though the book goes into a lof of detail, it was easy to read and kept me engaged. I kept thinking about this book in between reads a lot! The summary/blurb (of what I read) is very reductive, I was worried that it would focus on only one side / pov of the conflict but this is really not the case. Very well written!”
About Patrick Radden Keefe
PATRICK RADDEN KEEFE is a staff writer at The New Yorker, an Eric and Wendy Schmidt Fellow at the New America Foundation and the author of The Snakehead and Chatter. His work has also appeared in The New York Times Magazine, Slate, New York, and The New York Review of Books, among others and he is a frequent commentator on NPR, the BBC, and MSNBC. Patrick received the 2014 National Magazine Award for Feature Writing, for his story "A Loaded Gun," was a finalist for the National Magazine Award for Reporting in 2015 and 2016, and is also the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Other books by Patrick Radden Keefe
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