In a novel of delicacy and strength, Bernard Mac Laverty presents a harmonious vision of one woman's life, as passionate composer, anguished mother, tortured lover and troubled daughter.

Grace Notes

Literature & Fiction

MACLAVERTY, Bernard

Contemporary

Harpercollins

Bernard Mac Laverty's beautifully turned stories are full of humour, terse realism and moments of touching or shocking surprise. Nelson plays truant and sees something he wishes he hadn't in the title story, 'A Time to Dance'. In 'Phonefun Limited' Sadie and Agnes, retired prostitutes, hit upon an inventive new way of 'making someone happy with a phone call', while in 'My Dear Palestrina' a remarkable music teacher initiates her pupil into the mysteries of art and maturity.

A Time to Dance and Other Stories

Short Stories & Anthologies

Vintage, UK

The Anatomy School

Genre Fiction

Vintage

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.

Matters of Life and Death

Vintage Books

For the first time all of Bernard MacLaverty’s unforgettable short stories are gathered together, with a new introduction by the author Melding his native Irish sensibilities to those of his adopted west-coast Scotland, these tales attend to life’s big events: love and loss, separation and violence, death and betrayal. But the stories teem with smaller significant moments too—private epiphanies, chilling exchanges, intimate encounters. Each of these extraordinary stories—with their wry, self-deprecating humor, their elegance, and subtle wisdom—gets to the very heart of life. Since the publication of Secrets and Other Stories in 1977, Bernard MacLaverty has been celebrated as one of the finest living short-story writers. Writing in the New York Times, William Boyd summoned the shades of Yeats, Joyce, and Flann O'Brien, insisting that "MacLaverty sits perfectly comfortably" in their company.

Collected Stories (Vintage Classics)

United States

Vintage Classics

On a promontory jutting out into the Atlantic wind stands the home run by Brother Benedict, where boys are taught a little of God and a lot of fear. To Michael Lamb,one of the brothers, the regime is without hope, and when he inherits a small legacy he runs away, taking a 12-year-old boy with him.

Lamb

Literary

Penguin??Books

A haunting love story set against the grim backdrop of fear and violence in Northern Ireland.      For Cal, some of the choices are devastatingly simple... He can work in an abattoir that nauseates him or join the dole queue; he can brood on his past or plan a future with Marcella. Springing out of the fear and violence of Ulster, Cal is a haunting love story in a land where tenderness and innocence can only flicker briefly in the dark.

Penguin Uk

Cover creased, page edges tanned. Shipped from the U.K. All orders received before 3pm sent that weekday.

Penguin Books Canada, Limited

Cover worn, page edges tanned. Shipped from the U.K. All orders received before 3pm sent that weekday.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by MACLAVERTY, Bernard. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by MACLAVERTY, Bernard

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by MACLAVERTY, Bernard. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Grace Notes

A Time to Dance and Other Stories

The Anatomy School

Matters of Life and Death

Collected Stories (Vintage Classics)

Cal

Lamb

Cal

Cal

Lamb