MacLaverty, Bernard

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Cal
Bernard MacLaverty
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0393313328

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First published in 1983, this lyrical novel, superficially straightforward but full of stories within stories, first brought Bernard MacLaverty's work to public attention. In the novel, a young Irish Republican Army operative who wants to break the cycle of violence seeks out a woman whose Ulster policeman husband he helped to murder. As their relationship grows, so do Cal's guilt and sorrow, until, in the end, he is forced to make a sacrifice of himself in order to gain redemption. Rich in ideas and history, this book helps us understand the situation in Northern Ireland--which "is not just there," MacLaverty has remarked, "as a colorful background."

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Grace Notes
Bernard MacLaverty
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0393318419

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Composer Catherine McKenna has more of a gift for music than happiness, but she has long been driven beyond harmonies (musical and personal) that her Belfast family can understand. Bernard MacLaverty renders both sides of the equation: Catherine's feminist and aesthetic striving and her mother's more traditional grasp; it's hard not to sympathize with Mrs. McKenna's impatient rejoinder, "You don't cope with music, you listen to it."

Grace Notes, MacLaverty's first novel since Cal, is as much about Irish identity--and possibility--as it is about art. Catherine's newest piece, a mass, includes the huge drums Protestants play in parades. "It was a scary sound--like thunder. Like the town was under a canopy of dark noise." Though her fellow Catholics see the drums as instruments of threat, Catherine is determined to integrate them into her composition.

Her return to Belfast for her father's funeral brings back several ghosts, among them an influential professor who spoke of grace notes--"the notes between the notes." This novel is full of such instances, wry snatches of conversation and unforgettable observations: the new Chinese restaurant that has had to offer chips to stay in business, or the pub that's "on a slight hill. When dogs pissed at the door the dark lines ran diagonally to the gutter." These transcend the occasional passage in which MacLaverty tries too hard to see into the life and rhythms of a female artist. The final section, however, a live radio concert of Catherine's piece, is a triumph for both woman composer and male author.

Book Description

The luminous novel by one of the finest living Irish writers, which Brian Moore has praised as "in every sense a triumph ... moving throughout and ending triumphantly and joyously in its own special music." Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the Whitbread Prize and winner of the Saltire Scottish Book of the Year Award, Grace Notes is a compact and altogether masterful portrait of a woman composer and the complex interplay between her life and her art. With superb artistry and startling intimacy, it brings us into the life of Catherine McKenna-estranged daughter, vexed lover, new mother, and musician making her mark in a male-dominated field. It is a book that the Virginia Woolf of A Room of One's Own would instantly understand.

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Matters of Life and Death: Stories
Bernard MacLaverty
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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"MacLaverty's tales are poised and beautifully balanced, outward yet intimate, graced by both subtlety and substance."—The Independent A new book from Bernard MacLaverty is a cause for celebration, but Matters of Life and Death is more than that. It is the finest collection yet from a contemporary master of the form. Beginning with the sudden terror of a family caught up in shocking sectarian violence, and ending with the whiteout of an Iowa blizzard and the fear of losing your way very far from home, this collection is about bonds made and broken, secret and known. In the extraordinary story "Up the Coast," a landscape painter discovers a place that makes her, finally, feel whole, only to have that communion shattered by an arbitrary act of aggression that will resonate throughout her life. Written with effortless skill and empathy, these stories are hauntingly real. MacLaverty's perfect attention to every detail, every nuance of idiom and character, remakes the world for us here on the page.

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Fast paced novel
"Good" Catholic boy... an oxymoron?
simply put, he's one of the best fiction writers out there.
Growing up Catholic in working-class Belfast.

The Anatomy School
Bernard MacLaverty
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0393324575

Book Description

A coming-of-age story of a northern Irish boy getting out from under the thumb of mother, church, and country.

Set in Belfast in the late sixties, Bernard MacLaverty's new novel takes us into Martin Brennan's last semester of high school, when he finds old friendships tested and is forced to face the unknown. Before he can become an adult, Martin must unravel the sacred and contradictory mysteries of religion, science, and sex; he must learn the value of friendship; but most of all he must pass his exams—at any cost. Celebrating the desire to speak and the need to say nothing, The Anatomy School moves from the enforced silence of Martin's Catholic school retreat, through the hilarious tea-and-biscuits repartee of his eccentric elders, to the awkward wit and loose profanity of his two friends—the charismatic Kavanagh and the subversive Blaise Foley.

With characteristic "wise humor" (Publishers Weekly), MacLaverty "moves beyond the cloistered realm of school to capture the rhythms and pressures of provincial life, as well as [Martin's] desire to overcome them." (Denver Post). This absorbing, often funny novel "turns high anxieties and pain into well wrought fiction. MacLaverty has a wider vision, greater depth and technical craft than J. D. Salinger, a more subtle style than William Golding and a moral imagination to match that of James Joyce" ([Toronto] Globe and Mail). Reading group guide included.

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Fast paced novel.......2004-07-10

I picked up this book and I was surprised how fast paced it was. This novel takes place in a catholic community surrounding three teenage boys. The author was great at defining how kids in that type of community grow up.I would reccomend this book.

"Good" Catholic boy... an oxymoron?.......2003-07-21

This pitch-perfect foray into a young man's agonizing adolescence is made vivid by the small details of his daily life. Living at home with a devout Catholic mother, 1960's Belfast is a tough arena for a young man on the path toward manhood, especially when rigid Catholic school ethics stand sentinel over natural self-expression.

Strict Irish priests are rigorous in their training of young men, using corporal punishment, coupled with the occasional spiritual retreat: three days of silence, prayer and soul-searching. The most effective and lasting discipline is mental, constant drumming lectures concerning the nature of sin, especially when entertained as lascivious thoughts, where a boy's chastity is threatened by self-will. Martin Brennan and his friends survive just such an environment, their sexuality a driving force, as they bond in friendship defined by four-letter words and innuendo. Driven by hormones, conscience runs a close second, carefully nurtured through years of training.

To his shame, Brennan is repeating his last year of high school before seeking employment. Kavanagh, a star basketball player, is Martin's best pal and co-conspirator. When the more sophisticated Blaise Foley boards at their school, the paradigm changes, the three boys forming a lopsided triumvirate, as Blaise challenges Martin to question everything he has been taught. The free-floating anxiety common to boys on the verge of manhood tempers Martin and Kavanagh's natural hubris and enthusiasm.

The iconoclastic Blaise is a perfect foil to the more conscientious Brennan and Kavanagh, pricking holes in their beliefs and expectations. It is Blaise who suggests a scheme for passing exams, critical to each young man's future. Blaise is an antagonist whose best work is done while skating on the thin edge of risk, a practiced con man with a deep distrust of conformity. But ill-conceived interference by a disciplinarian begins a cycle of violence that leaves one boy fighting for his life and shocking the others into adulthood overnight. This injudicious incident changes the course of their futures.

Some harsh lessons burn a hole in the soul, a black mark that cannot be removed, possibly requiring a sojourn in Purgatory. But youthful experience denies the pull of grief and shame, where hope bravely shimmers, a light at the end of the tunnel.

There is a notable scene where Brennan loses his virginity, perfectly capturing the tortuous journey from exploration to intimacy. Unaware of his own charms, Brennan is an attractive young man to the opposite sex. His first foray into sexual adventure is tender and touching. MacLaverty skillfully portrays the difficult terrain of youthful maturity, when young boys perform age-old rituals that mark such significant events.

In a familiar and humorous rendition, MacLaverty's Martin Brennan, carefully tended by a religious mother who surrounds her son with moral values, is the essence of a boy's transition into the next phase of life, his struggles proscribed by universal experience, successfully navigating his path towards the future. Luan Gaines/2003.

simply put, he's one of the best fiction writers out there........2002-04-11

MacLaverty has a great feel for working class life. His characters feel very true, and the rhythms of his writing are incredibly seductive. You can feel his clear-eyed yet forgiving nature hovering over all his characters. Simply put, he's one of the best fiction writers out there. That said, The Anatomy School doesn't delve as deeply as you want it to. I prefer his short stories (see his "Walking the Dog" collection) which, with less words, achieve far richer, more suggestive results. Still, MacLaverty is always worth reading. His best themes are the failures of the church, and the sympathies between males. Both are treated excellently here. In fact, no one deals with maleness exactly the way MacLaverty does, allowing his male characters to express intense need, love and attraction for each other, without ever crossing over into the sexual. He defines an area of affection between straight men that few have ever explored before.

Growing up Catholic in working-class Belfast........2002-04-08

Confronting the usual thorny, coming-of-age issues of sex, religion, and morality, Belfast teenager Martin Brennan and his friends, with their hormones in high gear, are stunningly naïve, their primary concern, sex, remaining a mysterious, dark realm into which they must feel their own way. Unable to gain much needed knowledge of basic biology from home or school, they try to sublimate their urges, exploring the mysteries of faith, the example of Christ, the meaning of sin, and the importance of family and friends, while privately garnering as much information as they can about the Big Secret.

Brilliantly creating the jokey banter, braggadocio, and innuendoes of teenage conversations, MacLaverty introduces a main character who, while a bit more serious and naive than some of his friends, is still a typical teenager facing typical teenage problems. And that, to me, is both the attraction and limitation of this novel. Many readers will chuckle out loud as they relive their own pasts through Martin, but at the conclusion, some may also ask, "Is that all there is?" The superficial resolution of normal teenage predicaments, no matter how well presented here, may not be satisfying for readers who expect a broader treatment of themes and a deeper exploration of inner conflicts. The author's introduction of the Catholic/Protestant violence at the end of the novel seems gratuitous, an overly strong element used to make a generalized point about morality and religion--Martin is almost untouched by The Troubles.

The book pulses with the drama of teenage life, kooky characters, a wonderful feel for the tenuous relationships between teens and adults, and often hilarious repartee--especially with the "dotery coterie" of Martin's mother, the local priest, and her two friends. These individual delights are not fully integrated into a thematic whole, however, and the reader may be left feeling a bit short-changed at the end--thoroughly entertained, but no wiser. Mary Whipple

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Story Magazine [Summer 1994]
Walter Kirn , Maxine Clair , Ursula Hegi , Bernard MacLaverty , Hester Kaplan , Brad Udall , Thomas Barbash , Greg Sarris , Katharine Weber , and Paul Griner
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000EI3LRW

Product Description

contains the following stories: The Hoaxer by Walter Kirn, Lemonade by Maxine Clair, Acts of Violence by Ursula Hegi, Walking the Dog by Bernard MacLaverty, The Edge of Marriage by Hester Kaplan, The Wig by Brad Udall Ride by Thomas Barbash, The Magic Pony by Greg Sarris, Louisa Huntingtons Last Caller at Easter by Katharine Weber, Follow Me by Paul Griner, A Little Piece of Black by Lisa Fugard, Waiting for the Evening News by Tim Gautreaux, The Schoolmasters Wife by Istvan Tamas

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Matters of Life and Death
Bernard Maclaverty
Manufacturer: Vintage Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Short Stories | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0099493039
Release Date: 2007-06-05

Book Description

The finest short story collection yet from a contemporary master of the form.

A new book of stories from Bernard MacLaverty is a cause for celebration, but Matters of Life and Death is — without question — the finest collection yet from a contemporary master of the form.

Beginning with the sudden, nauseating terror of a family caught up in an explosion of shocking sectarian violence and ending with the white-out of an Iowa blizzard and a different kind of fear: the fear of displacement, erasure, of losing your way — and yourself — very far from home, Matters of Life and Death is a book about bonds and connections, made and broken, secret and known. In the extraordinary long story, ‘Up the Coast’, a landscape painter discovers a place that makes her feel whole, finally, only to have that communion cruelly shattered by an arbitrary act of aggression — an act that will resonate through her work and her life from that moment on.

Vivid, beautifully controlled and written with effortless skill and empathy, these stories are object lessons in the art of short fiction: the author’s perfect eye and ear attending to every detail, every nuance of idiom and character, to remake the world for us, here on the page.

From the Hardcover edition.

Andrew McAndrew (Young Childrens Fiction)

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Andrew McAndrew (Young Childrens Fiction)
Bernard MacLaverty , and Duncan Smith
Manufacturer: Walker Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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THE ANATOMY SCHOOL.
Bernard. MacLaverty
Manufacturer: P/B
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000O9SKPE

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Secrets and Other Stories
Bernard MacLaverty
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 014008102X

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Schule der Anatomie.
Bernard MacLaverty
Manufacturer: Ammann
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 3250600547

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