Showing results by narrator "Gerry O’Brien" in All Categories

Delve into the heart of religious history, where the enduring legacy of the Abrahamic faiths converge with tales of war and theology, revealing their profound impact on contemporary society. In this compelling narrative, religious historian Frank Kenny navigates the complex evolution of a warlike deity from the early scriptures of Jerusalem to the verses of the Bible and Qur’an they inspired. Challenging the one-dimensional portrayal of a benevolent God, The God of War offers a multifaceted view that spans the history of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

Jack Taylor still knocks back too much Jameson and dabbles in uppers, but he has a new woman in his life, a freshly bought apartment, and little sign of trouble on the horizon. Once again, trouble comes to him - this time in the form of a wealthy Frenchman who wants Jack to investigate the double-murder of his twin sons. Jack is meanwhile roped into looking after his girlfriend's nine-year-old son and is in for a shock with the appearance of a character out of his past. The plot is one big chess game, and all of the pieces seem to be moving at the behest of one dangerously mysterious player, a vigilante called "Silence"....

One of the great novels in the Irish comic tradition, The Crock of Gold (1912) consists of six parts. Bringing together pagan gods, policemen, prisoners, leprechauns and animals, the narrative concerns a philosopher and his quest to find the most beautiful woman in the world, Cáitilin Ni Murrachu, who has been abducted by the god Pan. His journey takes him from dark forests to the spectacular heights of pagan gods, as he experiences encounters that will change him forever.

Sean O'Driscoll's Heiress, Rebel, Vigilante, Bomber tells the astonishing story of Rose Dugdale, who went on to become a committed terrorist, participating in a major art heist and a bombing raid on a police and army barracks, who kept a pregnancy secret for nine months in prison and gave birth there and who ended up at the heart of the IRA's bomb-making operation during its deadly final spasms in the 1990s.

With his fiery Irish blood and well-known reputation for trouble, Lieutenant George Markham leads his embattled Royal Marines against the French in Corsica. His mission: to seize the island. Markham ventures across the island to persuade the veteran war hero Pasquali Paoli to unite the Corsicans behind him. But their loyalty remains torn by a heritage of vendettas, French bribery, and cross and double cross.

For too long the people of Tír na nÓg have suffered under the dominion of the drunes: strange druids who have poisoned the land with their magic. Sláine has had enough of their tyranny and, through the Earth Goddess, he learns some shocking truths about the priesthood and his own future. Now Sláine must unite the four kings of Tír na nÓg and use their mystical weapons as he and the Sessair tribe prepare for all-out war!

Introducing George Markham, lately of the 65th Regiment of Foot, now Lieutenant of Marines on His Britannic Majesty’s frigate Hebe. Irishman, papist, reputed coward; he is a man with something to prove. As the winter of 1793 comes to the Mediterranean coast of France, so too does the chill wind of the Revolutionary terror. When the Hebe is sent to help the Bourbon city of Toulon, Markham will have to prove he is a worthy officer of Marines…or die in the attempt.

The French Revolution is turning in on itself even as the war with the English drags on. As the armies move towards Italy, George Markham and his Marines find themselves assigned to the sloop Sylphide under the impetuous Captain Germain. Set ashore in the midst of the French army, Markham is charged with escorting a group of loyalists on a secret mission and is soon wishing he was back in the thick of it at sea.

Dracula is an 1897 Gothic horror novel by Irish author Bram Stoker. Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to move from Transylvania to England so he may find new blood and spread the undead curse, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor Abraham Van Helsing.

Patrick Deeley's train journey home to rural East Galway in autumn 1978 was a pilgrimage of grief: his giant of a father had been felled, the hurley-making workshop silenced. From this moment, Patrick unfolds his childhood as a series of evocative moments, from the intricate workings of the timber workshop run by his father to the slow taking apart of an old tractor and the physical burial of a steam engine.

Oscar Wilde's story of a fashionable young man who sells his soul for eternal youth and beauty is one of his most popular works. Written in Wilde's characteristically dazzling manner, full of stinging epigrams and shrewd observations, the tale of Dorian Gray's moral disintegration caused something of a scandal when it first appeared in 1890.

February 1922. Hollywood is young but already mired in scandal. When a leading movie director is murdered, Irish American investigator Tom Collins is called in by studio boss Mack Sennett, whose troubled star, Mabel Normand, is rumoured to be involved. But Normand has gone missing. And, as Collins discovers, there's a growing list of suspects. His quest leads him through the brutal heart of Prohibition-era Los Angeles, from speakeasies and dope dens to the studios and salons of Hollywood's fabulously wealthy movie elite, and to a secret so explosive it must be kept silent at any cost....

"The Happy Prince and Other Tales" (sometimes called "The Happy Prince and Other Stories") is a collection of stories for children by Oscar Wilde first published in May 1888. It contains five stories: "The Happy Prince", "The Nightingale and the Rose", "The Selfish Giant", "The Devoted Friend", and "The Remarkable Rocket".

The classic Oscar Wilde story brought to life. "The Picture of Dorian Gray" begins on a beautiful summer day in Victorian era England, where Lord Henry Wotton, an opinionated man, is observing the sensitive artist Basil Hallward painting the portrait of Dorian Gray, a handsome young man who is Basil's ultimate muse.

"Green Tea" tells the haunting story of a man plagued by a demonic monkey. The unnamed narrator, a trained surgeon who can’t practice because of the loss of two of his fingers, is organising the papers of his deceased mentor, the famous German physician Dr. Martin Hesselius. In doing so, he stumbles upon a strange case, dating back sixty-four years. Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu (1814-1873) was an Irish writer, known for his ghost and paranormal stories. He studied law at Trinity College in Dublin.

"A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" is the first novel of Irish writer James Joyce. A Künstlerroman in a modernist style, it traces the intellectual and religious philosophical awakening of young Stephen Dedalus, a fictional alter ego of Joyce and an allusion to Daedalus, the consummate craftsman of Greek mythology. Stephen questions and rebels against the Catholic and Irish conventions under which he has grown, culminating in his self-exile from Ireland to Europe.

This classic, early 19th century science fiction masterpiece serves as both a wonderful period presentation of the time as well as a cautionary tale. Called by many a "chilling novel account of a Martian invasion of London in the nineteenth century - a science fiction classic for all time." It was made famous by Orson Welles Mercury Theatre mid 20th Century adaptation that literally had thousands of people running for their lives at the time in the Northeast U.S. H. G.

A collection of 11 new short stories and six new poems by Ireland's top children's writers, edited by Laureate na nOg Eoin Colfer. Each of the stories and poems is based around the theme of place, being set or inspired by a particular location within Ireland.

This classic early-19th-century science-fiction masterpiece serves as both a wonderful period presentation of the time as well as cautionary tale. Called by many a "chilling novel account of a Martian invasion of London in the 19th century - a science-fiction classic for all time".

The inspiration behind Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic pirate tale Treasure Island, this is the long lost and almost forgotten true story of how two murderous pirates ended their days swinging in a gibbet on a small island off the coast of Dublin. From the busy streets of London to the exotic island of Tenerife via the vile slave markets on the western coast of Africa it tells of how a band of pirates murdered all those aboard a ship, stealing a treasure that was being secretly transported back to England and how they nearly got away with it....