The August Fiction Book Group will be meeting via Zoom
Monday, August 10th • 6:30 PM ET / 11:30 PM IST via Zoom
Session open to all, no registration required.
Click on this link to join the Zoom session
Find out about Solas Nua's Fiction Book Group and titles list
Join the Book Group's Facebook Group here!
"Angeline King journals the joyful, mischievous, innocent and infectious voice of teenager Stephanie Agnew, coming of age in the testing terrain of Northern Ireland in 1995. Stephanie has the same crazy daydreams as many of her age: good grades and romance, and poetic ambitions she delves deeper into a love of language, her locale’s fascinating history and an awakening to Ireland’s complex and shared history."
NJ McCarrigle, The Irish Times
"Utterly romantic and very funny. I enjoyed the carefully drawn mixture of light-hearted pathos and the 1990’s Ulster-specific anxiety surrounding the tension between causing offence and remaining authentic to your identity."
Shirley-Anne McMillan, Grapefruit Moon
"Stephanie’s poetic sensibility reveals the area’s historical layers of identity where Gaelic and Scots, unionist and nationalist, Scottish and Irish culture vie with each other but unite in Stephanie’s imagination to create a multi-faceted identity which soars beyond stark stereotypes. An engaging read for anyone fascinated by the shared cultures of Ireland and Scotland."
Billy Kay, author of Scots: The Mither Tongue
"Stephanie is earnest, bright, guiless and prone to mishaps..."
"This bright and often touching book is a worth addition to the mosaic of Troubles novels that are so important for our own understanding of the past, especially given that its Ulster-Scots perspective is still largely underrepresented. Louder, more commercial voices may, however, drown out this quiet tale, which would be a shame but also a mistake. In Northern Ireland, the need still exists to acknowledge experiences that are not our own. If we do, then we — like Stephanie — may be able to fully embrace reconciliation and respect."
Deborah Neill, Fortnight, Issue 498
"Everything she writes is a celebration of the twistiness of place. The fusion of cultures and languages. A love for our differences as well as our common human experiences."
Claire Mitchell, The Ghost Limb
About the Book
Set in Ballygally, Craigyhill and Kilwaughter in the summer of 1995, the diary centres on the summer experiences of teenager Stephanie, who works at the Ballygally Castle Hotel. Two months into her first summer of freedom, and Stephanie Agnew is up to her neck in thran passions and holy intensities, having destroyed her lips, elbows, knees and forehead in an obsession with Gaelic bards.
Angeline King returns to the spirit of Snugville Street with a genealogical mystery and an explosion of identity and language. The summer of 1995 is in full swing!
About the Author
Elaine Garvey is from County Sligo, Ireland. The Wardrobe Department, (Canongate), is her first novel. It has been shortlisted for the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year in 2026. It was also shortlisted for the Kate O’Brien Award, nominated in the Irish Book Awards, and was selected by The Sunday Independent, The Irish Times, The Financial Times and the BBC in their choices of the best new debut fiction in 2025. Elaine’s short stories have been published in The Dublin Review and Winter Papers.
All events are listed in Eastern Time and Irish Standard Time.
