“Declan Burke is his own genre. The Lammisters dazzles, beguiles and transcends. Virtuoso from start to finish.” – Eoin McNamee “This bourbon-smooth riot of jazz-age excess, high satire and Wodehouse flamboyance is a pitch-perfect bullseye of comic brilliance.” – Irish Independent Books of the Year 2019 “This rapid-fire novel deserves a place on any bookshelf that grants asylum to PG Wodehouse, Flann O’Brien or Kyril Bonfiglioli.” – Eoin Colfer, Guardian Best Books of the Year 2019 “The funniest book of the year.” – Sunday Independent “Declan Burke is one funny bastard. The Lammisters ... conducts a forensic analysis on the anatomy of a story.” – Liz Nugent “Burke’s exuberant prose takes centre stage … He plays with language like a jazz soloist stretching the boundaries of musical theory.” – Totally Dublin “A mega-meta smorgasbord of inventive language ... linguistic verve not just on every page but every line.Irish Times “Above all, The Lammisters gives the impression of a writer enjoying himself. And so, dear reader, should you.” – Sunday Times “A triumph of absurdity, which burlesques the literary canon from Shakespeare, Pope and Austen to Flann O’Brien … The Lammisters is very clever indeed.” – The Guardian

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

First The Phillies, Now This …

Quoth the Irish Times:
“Tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.”

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

She's not into crime (that I know of), but children's author Meg Rosoff has some fairly worthy thoughts on life and all that, on her website this morning.
http://www.megrosoff.co.uk/bio.html
Go on and read the bit on ambition, too.

Corey Wilde said...

We are still feeling pretty giddy this am in Ohio. The realization that "democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope" were not stabbed to death by the Bush administration is a heady one.

John McFetridge said...

Yes, first the Phillies now this.

And Bookwitch that piece on ambition is very good. When does ambition become greed? Who gets to decide what "better place" the world is made into? How does one persons success impact on another's failure?

More questions than answers, certainly, but that's the point. And it sure does fit into crime fiction, in many ways it's the big theme we wrestle everyday. Just look at The Big O and the role of ambition.