Nothing like a complete departure from the plot in the middle of a series. I felt cheated when I realized the "schmall story" Kinky began with would carry on through the entire book. And Taylor may as well have stayed in the past instead of distracting the reader with Kinky's cooking activities, since nothing was added to the present-day storyline. While Taylor's knack for spinning a tale kept me reading until the end (which I found to be weak and anticlimactic), it's probably safe to skip this one, or treat it as seperate from the rest of the series if you want a good Irish yarn. Patrick Taylor goes to a slightly different location & time in his fourth "Irish Country" novel, in order to tell the story of Dr. O'Reilly's much-loved housekeeper, Mrs. "Kinky" Kincaid. Told from the perspective of Kinky herself as she tells a Christmas day ghost story to a group of local children out caroling in order to give them a chance to warm up & have a snack, the story takes place in a small village in County Cork, at the opposite end of Ireland, in the 1920's. It's a very different place from Northern Ireland in the '60's - young Maureen O'Hanlon, as she is then, experiences a daily life akin to that of generations of inhabitants, hearing much the same stories - especially those involving the actions of the dubh sidhe, or fairies. The novel has much the same "cozy" feel as the earlier installments, but with a strong dose of traditional native Irish culture, & readers will find themselves relying heavily on the Gaelic glossary at the back of the book. It's a beautiful & melodic language, but the pronunciations will NOT come naturally to non-native speakers. As a person who likes to hear the "local color" correctly, as it would be spoken by the characters, I was grateful for a pronunciation guide. Maureen's story is one that contains much love, a tightly knit family & small community, & her own romantic love, but it also has a fair amount of sorrow as well as an indication of what things are like when a new culture begins to clash with older traditions - Maureen struggles to convince her loved ones to support her dreams of completing her schooling & becoming a teacher in a place where a woman's life isn't expected to go anywhere besides marriage, a home, & children. It's a good tale, & definitely makes me want to go visit Ireland even more as before.
What do You think about An Irish Country Girl (2010)?
An light easy read that unravels some Irish folklore.
—barb100
