“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

Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Ay Caramba! ’Tis John Bartville!

It may be a little behind in its Benny Blanco from the Bronx (aka Benjamin Black) coverage, but given that the elves are huge (as in, tiny-but-keen) fans of The Simpsons, we couldn’t resist the following post from The Writer’s Times :
Interesting piece in today’s Metro about John Banville’s new novel. THE SILVER SWAN is a break from his usual literary output. It’s a thriller, based on something that happened in his local Dublin neighbourhood. Writing as Benjamin Black, Banville has set the novel in the 1950s, exposing the dark side of Ireland, where church and state ruled with a grimness rivalling regimes behind the Iron Curtain … Adopting a different style seems to have helped Banville get back on track with the style which won him the Booker in 2005 for THE SEA.
“... I wrote the Black books, [says Banville] which are all about character and plot, to give myself a bit of a kick.”
It seems to have worked – he’s 6,000 words into a new Banville novel, although he says that, for a writer, all that matters is writing the perfect line: “Each time I sit down to write, I think of Bart Simpson inscribing on the blackboard, ‘I must write a better sentence.’ And I’d sacrifice anything to get a sentence right.”
Insert your own ‘Homeric struggle’ punchline at your leisure, folks …

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Declan,

Just wanted to say I've got my copy (signed by the author, thank you most kindly) of The Big O in my crime loving mitts. Started today and am already sucked in.

Good luck with the book in the US and wherever else it may be snapped up...

Declan Burke said...

Thanks for dropping by, Laura. I'd be keen to hear your verdict when (if!) you make it all the way through ... Cheers, Dec