GoRail Aug-Sept 2012 Vol 02 Issue 03

AUG - SEPT 2012 VOL:02 ISSUE:03

No Regrets KIAN EGAN ON LIFE AFTER WESTLIFE And Baby Makes Six...

THE SATURDAYS UNA HEALY Can Dublin Hold On To Sam? BERNARD BROGAN INTERVIEWED

TOMMY TIERNAN IT’S A MAD MAD MAD MAD WORLD TOUR!

TONY F ENTO N EL A I N E C R OW L E Y PAT R I C K D E W I T T

d r a o b n O r e i s a E s Itďż˝

g n i r e f f o e c i v r e s d r a o b n o with our

Fresh & also

Tasty Range of

Handmade

Sandwiches

& Pastries

also

al Hot & Cold Beverages Hot & Cold Snacks Newspapers

CONTENTS AUG-SEPT 2012 VOLUME: 2 ISSUE: 3

T O M M Y T I E R N A N P22 6 GO FOR IT A rundown of what’s hot and happening throughout the country.

the Westlife boys recently decided to go their separate ways. KIAN EGAN discusses life after pop superstardom.

18 GO NEWS Up-to-date train news from Iarnród Éireann.

38 THE WRITE STUFF Canadian author and Booker nominee PATRICK DeWITT discusses his latest work, The Sisters Brothers.

22 NAVAN A LAUGH Meath comedian TOMMY TIERNAN chats about his forthcoming 'world tours' of Ireland, and explains where he finds inspiration for his routines.

26 SOMETHING KINDA UNA Tipperary native and one-fifth of chart-topping band The Saturdays UNA HEALY opens up to Go Rail about superstardom, life on the road, and of course – latest arrival, baby Aoife.

30 IN FOR THE KIL There's plenty to see and do in the beautiful and historic city of Kilkenny.

34 INTO THE WEST Having spent a phenomenal 14 years together,

40 LONDON CALLING As the 2012 Olympic Games continue to unfold, we catch up with top Irish competitors including boxer JOHN JOE NEVIN and runners AVA HUTCHINSON and LINDA BYRNE.

company’s headquarters and flagship store in Kilmacanogue, Wicklow.

51 SETTING THE TONE Legendary radio D.J. TONY FENTON shares his favourite train journey.

52 FRENCH FANCY TV3's ELAINE CROWLEY joins STUART CLARK for a bite to eat in Dublin's Les Frères Jacques.

56 GO FASHION Chic summer simplicity is the name of the game this season! Follow our tips to look effortlessy stylish.

44 IN DUBLIN'S FAIR CITY Dublin dramatically brought Sam Maguire home last summer, but can they make it two in a row?

Dubs player BERNARD BROGAN tells us why he and his teammates are more than up for the challenge.

60 GO HEALTH Your baby's skin is delicate, sensitive and prone to various uncomfortable conditions. We talk you through keeping your little one in the best of health.

48 GO BUSINESS M.D. of Avoca Handweavers, SIMON PRATT, talks shop as he takes Go Rail on a tour of the

62 REVIEWS Our team of reviewers cast their eye over the latest albums, books and D.V.D.s.

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GRAHAM KEOGH

CREDITS

Irish Olympic hopeful, Katie Taylor

AUG - SEPT 2012 VOLUME: 2 ISSUE: 2 MANAGING EDITOR

Máirín Sheehy

COMMISSIONING EDITOR

Roisin Dwyer

CONTRIBUTORS

Gráinne Aylward Stuart Clark Craig Fitzpatrick Monica Heck Maeve Heslin Emma Hutchinson Roe McDermott Celina Murphy Paul Nolan Colm O'Hare Máire Rowland Marie Ryan Anne Sexton

DESIGN & PRODUCTION

Hot Press 13 Trinity Street Dublin 2

DESIGN

David Keane Andrew Duffy Rebecca Dobson (intern) Laura Brunnock (intern)

PRODUCTION

Maeve Heslin

STUDIO MANAGER

Graham Keogh

PRINTED BY

Boylan’s Print

ADVERTISING

Trish Murphy

PUBLISHER

Niall Stokes

GO RAIL IS PUBLISHED FOR IARNRÓD ÉIREANN BY: Osnovina Ltd 13 Trinity Street Dublin 2

TELEPHONE

(01) 2411 500

FAX

(01) 2411 538

EMAIL

gorail@hotpress.ie

LETTERS

The Editor, Go Rail Magazine, 13 Trinity St Dublin 2

While every effort has been made to ensure the information in this magazine is correct, the publishers cannot accept any responsibilities for errors. The views contained in this magazine are those of the authors and not necessarily those of Iarnród Eireann.

All material © Osnovina 2012. All rights reserved.

Reproduction of material without permission of the publishers is strictly prohibited.

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THE TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGIN I

t is hard to believe that August is nearly upon us.

The best weather of the year was at the end of May, which is officially summer but never quite feels like it because so much is focussed on schools, colleges and exams.

In June the temperature scraped into the 20s on a few occasions, but it was the near racing certainty of rain on the horizon that made it all seem depressing. The eighth month of the year is unlikely to offer anything more heart-warming – unless of course you’re talking about the Olympic Games and the prospect of an Irish gold medal or two.

Of course August wasn’t always the eighth month of the year. The Roman calendar used to begin in March, and the year was split into ten months, making August – before it was called August! – the sixth. There were just 304 days in the calendar, with two months of ‘winter’ hanging there on the outside, like unused clothes on an old line. That’s probably how people felt, in what must have been very cold times indeed.

The months were based on the time it took from when a new moon appeared until it had fully waned – an average of 29.5 days – and rather than running from 1 to 30, they were counted backwards from three named points: the nones, the ides and the calend of the following month. In this convention lies the origin of the admonition, famous from William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, “beware the ides of March.” At the moment, in truth we tend to beware the ides of just about every month. For your information, in the modern calendar, they occur on the 13th day of the month, for eight months of the year and the 15th of March, May, July and October.

Make a note of that in case it comes up in a quiz sometime over the next ten or 15 years. Originally named Sextilis (meaning sixth), the month was renamed August in 8BC, after the emperor

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Augustus.

The 365-day calendar had been in operation in Egypt – they were very good at maths and astronomy there – and it was Julius Caesar himself (after whom July was named), who decreed in 46BC that it should be applied in Rome too, and thereby, gradually, throughout much of Europe. He applied a mix of 29 and 31 day months representing a significant step forward in organising the cycle of human affairs. But calculations were not as robust as had been hoped for and a slippage of approximately ten days had occurred by the time a decision was made by Pope Gregory, in 1582, to alter the calendar again, to what is the modern 365 day Gregorian Calendar, with leap years of an extra day in February every four years to minimise slippage. It took centuries for this new calendar to filter around the world. Across the British Empire, including Ireland and America, to get into step with the modern world, Wednesday 2 September 1752 was followed by Thursday 14 September 1752. Y2K had nothing on it.

All of which is a stark reminder that we take so much for granted in life – the months sail by as if they could only ever have been exactly as they are. But this is just a construct, replacing a different construct that had passed its sell by date.

As you roll across the Irish countryside, enjoying the comfort and safety of the train, it is worth contemplating, just how much of what we believe in so fervently today will still be around in a thousand or even a hundred years time.

Which, in a sense, brings us full circle. Rain or no rain, let’s enjoy it all while we can. Time marches on – now is the moment to appreciate what we have.

Have a lovely journey...

Mairin Sheehy, Editor

Heritage Sites of Ireland For only €21 for an adult, or €8 for a student, enjoy unlimited admission for one year to these and many more heritage sites throughout the country with our excellent value OPW Heritage Card.

Donegal Castle, Co. Donegal

Brú na Bóinne (Newgrange & Knowth) , Co. Meath

Pearse Museum, Dublin 16

Aughnanure Castle, Co. Galway

Glendalough Visitor Centre, Co. Wicklow

Ionad an Bhlascaoid Mhóir The Blascaod Centre, Co. Kerry

JFK Arboretum, Co. Wexford

Derrynane House, Co. Kerry

Tintern Abbey, Co. Wexford

Cahir Castle, Co. Tipperary

Rock of Cashel, Co. Tipperary

Charles Fort, Co. Cork

Further information available at 01 6476592 Lo Call 1850 600601 e-mail: heritagecard@opw.ie

See full details of all sites at www.heritageireland.ie

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A R U N D O W N O F W H AT ’ S H O T & H A P P E N I N G B Y MONICA HECK & MÁIRE ROWLAND

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FULL SAIL AHEAD

As the final stop for the Tall Ship Races, Dublin’s Docklands are set to be transformed into an area of maritime celebration when up to 50 tall ships descend on the port on August 23. Starting off from St. Malo, France in early July, the fleet races across the Bay of Biscay to Lisbon, Portugal and then on to Cádiz in Spain, before cruising along the Portuguese coast to Spanish harbour A Coruna. Then it’s the last leg of the journey to the Irish Sea and Dublin where they’ll be met at the quays by street performers, buskers and bands in the afternoon and a series of illuminated performances and events in the evening.

Elsewhere, George’s Dock will play host to a Bulmers live music stage and Grand Canal Square will feature a family programme of free nautical-themed workshops and installations, interactive concerts, puppet shows, storytelling and water sports displays in Grand Canal Dock. The four-day celebration will culminate with a chance to wave farewell to the fleet on the last day, August 26. A full festival programme can be found at www.dublintallships.ie.

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CELEBRATING

Living Legends at the Irish National Stud

CHARLIE CHAPLIN

See some legendary horses and enjoy a world famous location where Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II came to visit in 2011.

Back for its second year, the Charlie Chaplin Comedy Film Festival is set to take over Waterville, Co. Kerry from August 23 – 26. Honouring the spirit of the great comedy hero, the festival hosts four film competitions to find the filmmakers best channeling the humour and social commentary of the comic, including the ‘Charlie Chaplins of the future’, their under-18s only category. Non-competitive events include the Tramps Ball, a fancy dress affair encouraging attendees to dress up to the nines or come as if they’re living on their last dime, along with nightly live music performances and daily matinee circus shows.

Stand-up comedy in the local bars, up-cycling clothes and makeup workshops, circus skills for children and the very best in Chaplinesque Irish and international street theatre – mime artists, magicians, puppeteers and even a mentalist or two, round out the programme for what promises to be four days very much in line with the spirit of the pioneering, comedy great.

• Arrow or Mainline train to Kildare (Free Shuttle bus to Kildare Village shopping outlet & Irish National Stud) • Guided tours of Stud farm daily • World famous Japanese Gardens • Horse Museum • St. Fiachra’s Garden One admission charge covers all 4 • Gift shop, restaurant, children’s playground, picnic area • Free Car & Coach Park • OPEN: Mid February to Mid November - 7 days a week

ABSOLUT

PRODUCE THIS VOUCHER AND RECEIVE A 2 FOR THE PRICE OF 1 ADMISSION Location: Located 30 miles south of Dublin in Kildare Off the M7, Exit 13 onto the R 415.

Reservations: Tel: +353 (0)45 521617 Email: reservations@instourism.net Web: www.irishnationalstud.ie (Online shop)

EXCITEMENT

Have you discovered Waterford City?

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Bisho

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Word River

Ever dreamed of taking a trip down the Liffey? How about influencing someone else’s love life or seeing an opera based on the love between man and his Ikea flatpack furniture? Look no further than Ireland’s largest crossdiscipline arts festival, as productions from all over the globe mixed with local talent bring you the very best and very quirkiest of comedy, theatre, music, dance, circus and the spoken word. Now in its 18th year, the ABSOLUT Fringe fest with over 500 events in over 40 venues is a highlight of the Irish festival calendar, with around 150,000 people a year taking in at least one of the shows on offer. It runs for 16 days, from September 8 – 23. Full details of what’s on offer can be found at www.fringefest.com.

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facebook.com/discoverwaterfordcity

Picture the experience in Ireland’s oldest city!

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GOFOR IT Lisa Hannigan

DUBLIN GOES

GAGA

Whether donning a meat dress or wearing impossibly uncomfortable skyscraper heels, you never know quite what to expect from pop’s Queen of the Freaks, Lady Gaga. Her Born This Way Ball hits these shores on September 15 and if her previous shows are anything to go by, the audience at the Aviva will be treated to a highly entertaining and magnificently eccentric display.

Comprising of five acts, and set amid a threestorey medieval castle, Gaga’s latest tour incorporates a mechanical horse, a human motorcycle, a meat couch, a shotgun bra and a somewhat graphic childbirthing scene. Gaga will be supported on the night by high-pitched Brit-rockers The Darkness. Tickets for the show start at €54.65 and are available from www.ticketmaster.ie.

HOT TO EVERYWHERE TROT

CULTURE CULTURE

It’s that time of the year again – ladies don their best hats, and horses and jockeys roll out their best performances to the delight of tens of thousands of visitors.

One of the biggest staples of Dublin’s summertime social calendar, the horse show also offers music, shopping, family activities, the R.D.S. student art awards and national crafts competition and of course the Blossom Hill Ladies' Day, where the most stylish ladies and gents will be rewarded.

This year, because of the London Olympic Games, the Dublin Horse Show takes place later than usual – the 2012 show runs from August 15–19. Book your tickets now at www. dublinhorseshow.com.

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All around the country, Ireland’s cultural centres, museums, galleries, churches, historic houses and artists’ studios are preparing to keep their doors open late on September 21 to give locals and tourists alike a chance to sample the country’s best cultural offerings for free. Everything from talks to tours to musical performances and workshops will be on offer at Culture Night 2012, which sees participants extend their normal hours to 11pm (as far as possible) for a night of entertainment. The Culture Night initiative started with the Temple Bar Cultural Trust in 2006 and though originally a Dublin event, now takes place in around 30 Irish towns, cities, counties and islands. Events may be free, but with the growing popularity of the night, some require advance booking. Details can be found at www. culturenight.ie or www.templebar.ie

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RUTH MEDJBER

GOFOR IT

ELECTRIC ENTERTAINMENT Blending a fantastic musical line-up with top-quality art, theatre, comedy, pantomime and food, Ireland’s premier festival Electric Picnic will once again return to Stradbally Hall from August 29 – September 2 as the highlight of the season. It's a cracking line-up, with the likes of The Killers, Elbow, Christy Moore, Azealia Banks, The xx, James Murphy (DJ set), The Cure, Ed Sheeran, Orbital, Sigur Ros and Hot Chip all set to perform. Away from the main music stages, the comedy tent provides top-notch performances sure to make you laugh, while the spoken word area is a hive of some of the island’s best spokenword poetry and thoughtful discussion and debate. Elsewhere, the Art Trail can offer a little something for the creatively minded, and Fossett’s Circus gives revellers the opportunity to remind themselves of the magic of classic circus performance.

All of that is hungry work so the Theatre of Food, the Picnic’s dedicated food area, returns for its second year for another round of food demos, wine tastings, gastrocompetitions, panel discussions and pop-up dining. An unmissable weekend of much more than just music!

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CULINARY CAPITAL

Aiming to be the food capital of Ireland, the people of Cork aren’t content with offering just one festival of epicurean delights this summer.

Coming to Fitzgerald’s Park from July 19 to 22, the Cork Food Festival will see local restaurants show off their menus and skills to a new audience, while local Cork producers will do their best to highlight what Cork has to offer locally. Then it’s a short break before the Cork City International Gourmet Festival from July 28 to August 6. This wellestablished event showcases the restaurants and food producers of the city and its surrounds and this year incorporates events in Cobh for the Titanic 100 celebrations. Ten days of workshops, family days out, a parade, restaurant offers, the Gala Titanic Ball and the always popular Cork Gourmet Trail and a Jazz Brunch mean the Cork gourmet festival should be top of every foodie’s to-do list.

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THE BARD IS BACK

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Whenever Leonard Cohen comes to town, he brings his reputation as an iconic poet and unparalleled wordsmith with him.

Now, the man with the gravelly voice and supremely sardonic turn of phrase makes his triumphant return to Dublin as part of his ‘Old Ideas’ World Tour at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham on September 11, 12, and 14.

The world-class lyricist changed music forever in 1967 when he released “Suzanne” on his debut album, Songs of Leonard Cohen. Since then, countless artists including Jeff Buckley, R.E.M., Willie Nelson, Nick Cave and Bono of U2 have covered Cohen’s ballads. Arguably his most famous song, “Hallelujah”, has been performed by almost 200 artists in various languages.

In 2010, the highly decorated performer won a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. On the last two occasions Cohen was in Ireland, he won both the 2009 and 2010 Meteor Music Award for Best International Live Performance. Cohen’s September performances are sure to be true to form.

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GOFOR IT

STARS & STRIPES CHOW DOWN IN CARLINGFORD

Voted this year’s ‘Best Place to live in Ireland’, Carlingford boasts an excellent calendar of events throughout the entire year. One of the highlights of the summer season, the Carlingford Oyster Festival returns to the town August 11 – 12 and the best-loved aspects of the festival are back and better than ever. From street entertainment and the artisan food and craft street market to the oyster tent, sailing regatta and the chance to sample the famous Carlingford Seafood Chowder, the two-day event is packed full of activities

for even the pickiest of people.

For the little ones, the Oyster Pearl Treasure Hunt on the Carlingford Lough shore and the World Crab Fishing Contest are always highlights; the time spent searching for the ugliest, prettiest, smallest and largest crabs is sure to keep them going for the day. A magic show, face-painting, a teddy bear’s picnic, free kayaking lessons, kiddies’ cookery demonstration and a funfair round off the offerings for the children in what promises to be a fantastic weekend for all the family.

Centuries of emigration and subsequent culture meshing have developed a strong connection between Irish trad and American blues and roots music. The Galway Americana Festival, September 13 – 16, explores the crossover of these types of music by inviting folk, bluegrass, Cajun, rockabilly and old-time bands to play in the west of Ireland alongside Irish traditional music groups. The festival takes place in a number of venues throughout Galway City. As well as music there will be barn dances, musicology lectures, exhibitions and open sessions.

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3 Nights Dinner B&B (No Single Occupancy Supplement) Available Sunday -- Thursday, excludes festival dates June, July & August €169pp September -- December €159pp

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Town Centre Location Leisure Centre Tranquillity Spa Close to Wexford Train Station

Whites of Wexford, Abbey Street, Wexford Ph: 05391 22311 www.whitesofwexford.ie

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TRAD FOR IT PHILIP LYNOTT EXHIBITION RETURNS TO STEPHEN'S GREEN The legendary Philip Lynott exhibition, Still In Love With You, has returned to Dublin, after taking London by storm. Documenting the life and times of the Thin Lizzy frontman, it collected rave reviews and attracted people from all around the world to Dublin when it first opened, so don’t miss its second coming!

Still In Love With You – The Philip Lynott Exhibition documents the music and memories of a rock legend, alongside tour jackets, instruments, flight cases, a personal diary, letters and other memorabilia, video installations and tributes from other artists including Bono, Imelda May and Brian Downey of Thin Lizzy.

New material has been included from the archives of music, culture and entertainment magazine Hot Press. Rock enthusiasts should not miss what is, in the words of the magazine’s editor Niall Stokes, “an extraordinary story of an extraordinary Irishman.”

The Philip Lynott Exhibition runs from July 19 – September 30 in the Exhibition Space, Stephen’s Green Shopping Centre, Dublin. More information and ticket purchase at www.philiplynottexhibition.com.

Liam Ó Maonlaí

Renowned in Ireland and beyond for its excellent hosting of the Other Voices music sessions, Dingle in Co. Kerry has an enviable live music reputation. This makes the prospect of the peninsula town’s trad-fusion music festival all the more appealing. Not content with just providing concerts for punters indoors, the festival line-up also includes a live session on the top of Mount Bandon. The goal of the festival is to promote Irish music in a new and unique way which includes a fresh take on the céilí in the form of a Saturday night trad-disco. Liam Ó Maonlaí and KAN (featuring Brian Finnegan and Aidan O’Rourke) are just some of the acts making the trek southwards for the festival, which runs from September 8 – 11. A full list of performers and venue information is available at www.dingletradfest.com.

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GOFOR IT

THY KINGDOM

COME

ALL WHITE ON THE NIGHT Luxury spas and swimming pools may be ten-a-penny in hotels around the country, but Whites Hotel in Wexford town offers an impressive addition. As well as having the usual spa option, the hotel boasts a cryotherapy clinic, the first in both Ireland and the UK. County G.A.A. players and British rugby players have been known to make the trip to Whites to speed up injury recovery time. The treatment works by cooling the entire skin surface of the body in order to develop defensive reflexes and reactions such as stimulation of blood circulation, endocrine system, the immune system and the central nervous system. For those who are fortunate enough to be injury-free, cryotherapy also provides stress relief, helps combat sleep disorders and enhances general well-being.

The Rose of Tralee festival has become synonymous with the talent and beauty which takes over Tralee for five days every summer. Unleash your inner beauty queen and head down to Kerry to see the Rose Parade! While you’re there, enjoy the street entertainment, live concerts, markets, funfair and fireworks. This year’s festival runs from August 17 – 21. Tickets for the selection nights, the gala Rose Ball, the fashion show, the disco and a performance by Jedward are available for purchase on www.roseoftralee.ie.

You might even try and hunt down a flower called the Rose of Tralee, bred and registered by Sam McGredy, a Portadown rose grower...

SUMMER @ NCH

HORSLIPS

SATURDAY 25/SUNDAY 26 AUG

In what is set to be a musical highlight of the summer, Horslips play two nights accompanied by the Orchestra of The National Concert Hall with stunning new arrangements by Golden Globe nominee Brian Byrne.

Tickets from €25

Box Office Tel: 01 417 0000 • www.nch.ie no booking fees 14

THE PLOUGH FACTOR

HORSING AROUND Discover the love story between Ireland and its horses by visiting the home of the finest thoroughbreds. The Irish National Stud in Kildare has been around since 1900 and visitors can drop in and visit at their leisure, or take a guided tour.

After a tour of the horse museum, spend some time in contemplation at the unique and very renowned Japanese Gardens before strolling in St. Fiachra’s Garden, which is a tribute to Irish nature.

British monarch Elizabeth Windsor, aka Queen Elizabeth II, included a visit to the stud last year on her Irish visit, probably to see for her own eyes where the winners of five Classics for her family were produced. For more information, visit www. irishnationalstud.ie. The National Stud is offering Go Rail readers a special 2-for-1 deal on admission. To avail of this offer, simply produce the voucher on page 7.

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Ploughing as a sport among neighbours has probably gone on for hundreds of years, but it was in 1931 that the first inter-county ploughing match was organised in Ireland. Nowadays the National Ploughing Championships, Ireland’s farming festival, attracts over a hundred thousand visitors every year. This year’s extravaganza of food, machinery, music and cattle is taking place in New Ross, Wexford from September 25–27. The event incorporates all sectors of agriculture and rural living, featuring displays of the latest developments in agrimachinery and renewable energy, food fairs, music performances, welly throwing (!), cookery demonstrations and much more.

GOFOR IT

OPERA-TING THEATRE If you fancy a musical lunch-break with a bit of cachet, be sure to catch one of the hour-long lunchtime performances of Opera in the Open. They run every Thursday in August at 1pm in the Amphitheatre of the Civic Offices on Wood Quay in Dublin 8, except on August 23 when the performance migrates to the site of the Dublin Tall Ships Races event.

The 13th edition offers a choice between Puccini’s Madame Butterfly on August 2, Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin on August 9, Weill’s Street Scene – An American

Opera on August 16, Mozart’s Cosi Fan Tutte at the Tall Ships Races event on August 23 and Verdi’s Rigoletto back at the Civic Offices on August 30.

The performances are directed by Eoin Cannon with musical direction from David Wray and feature Janyce Condon, Deirdre Masterson, Simon Morgan, James Nelson, Brian Gilligan, Sandra Oman, Liz Ryan, Alison Doyle, Brendan Collins, Morgan Crowley, Cliona Cassidy, Declan Kelly, Alex Otterburn, Kay Lynch, Owen Gilhooly and Lawrence Thackeray.

BORN TO BE TRAD FASHION FRIENDLY

Fresh from a televised make-over on Channel Four’s Country House Rescue, the majestic surrounds of West Cork’s Bantry House, along with St. Brendan’s Church, will play host to Irish traditional music festival Masters Of Tradition from August 15 – 19. Bantry House has been home to the White family since 1739 and this year’s festival allows us to witness top-class musical talent in the grounds of this historical house.

The concept of the event is to provide a simple, de-cluttered environment for the very best of Irish musicians where they can share their take on traditional music. As well as concerts each evening, there are Irish traditional music workshops and masterclasses.

The festival is headlined by the renowned and innovative fiddler Martin Hayes from east Clare. For more information and a full list of the musicians performing, visit www.westcorkmusic.ie.

Haute couture hits the capital with a stylish bang this September, as the celebration of Dublin’s Fashion Festival gets underway. Ireland has an impressive fashion heritage and each year the festival showcases the plethora of design talent that we have to offer.

The four-day event offers fashionistas a first-hand glance at AutumnWinter collections, hair and make-up tips from experts and special offers on beauty products and designer blag.

One of the highlights of the festival, which runs from September 8 – 11, promises to be the Night Time Fashion Shows where the vibrant night life of the country’s capital will merge with original and exciting new fashion creations. And by way of a bonus - it’s all free! Fabulous dahling!

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LEICESTER

BANGS Anybody who has ever seen Leicester lads Kasabian on stage will know that their show in Marlay Park this August will be an unforgettable one. Kasabian have wowed Irish audiences on several occasions, including a magical gig at Dublin Castle and two stomping headline performances at the O2.

Supported by Noel Gallagher & The High Flying Birds, The Cribs and Maverick Sabre, the south Dublin concert promises to be a day of epic anthems, swaggering frontmen and good old-fashioned rock ‘n’ roll attitude. The concert takes place on August 22 and tickets are available from www. ticketmaster.ie

VISIT

VISIT THE ORIGINAL JAMESON DISTILLERY

• OPEN 7 DAYS • GUIDED TOURS • WHISKEY TASTING The Old Jameson Distillery Dublin, Bow Street, Smithfield, Dublin 7.

E: reservations@ojd.ie, T: +353 (0) 1 807 2355,

Book online to receive a 10% discount on tours

www.tours.jamesonwhiskey.com

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GONEWS

HAVE YOU TAKEN THE LEAP YET?

Over 100,000 commuters in the Greater Dublin area are already using Leap Cards to pay for their public transport journeys around Dublin.

H

ave you taken the leap, and picked up a Leap Card yet? Leap Card is the new way to pay for travel around Dublin. You can use it on all DART, Commuter Rail (Short Hop Zone), Dublin Bus and Luas services in the capital.

Simply buy your Leap Card at a Leap Card shop (there’s about 400 in Dublin) or online at www. leapcard.ie, top it up with Travel Credit, and away you go.

If you currently pay cash to buy single tickets on the participating services, you should get a

Leap Card because: – Leap Card fares are up to 11% cheaper than Dublin Bus single tickets, up to 17% cheaper than Luas singles, and up to 18% cheaper than DART and Commuter Rail singles, – It’s flexible and convenient – You can jump on participating transport services around Dublin when it suits you, without having to plan your journey or buy a specific ticket in advance. No more rooting around in your pockets for the right change. Just pay the appropriate fare with the Travel Credit on your Leap Card, – Once your travel credit runs low, simply top it

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up again and away you go, – You can register your Leap Card online to protect your travel credit if your card is lost or stolen.

Iarnród Éireann is also introducing the Leap Card to ticket vending machines in stations. You’ll now be able to buy or top up the Leap Card across the Short Hop Zone, making it even more convenient. Look out for the Leap Card logo on the ticket vending machine in your station as each station is phased in over the coming weeks.

It’s cheaper, more convenient and more flexible.

So take the Leap today!

GONEWS

GREAT VALUE THIS SUMMER

E

veryone’s looking for good value family activities this summer, whether it’s a day break, short holiday or full staycation.

Iarnród Éireann has some fantastic family offers, valid until August 31st, to help keep the cost of travel low, and the relaxation and enjoyment high.

Around the network, you can bring two adults and up to four children on a journey between Galway and Dublin for example for just ¤79 for an open return (up to 30 days).

From Cork-Dublin, this offer costs just ¤99, and from Waterford-Dublin it’s ¤69. Check

www.irishrail.ie or your local station for offers on other routes.

In the Dublin area, your family can have a full day’s travel for just ¤10, covering the entire short hop zone – that’s the full DART network, and commuter lines as far as Balbriggan, Maynooth, Hazelhatch and Greystones. With your tenner ticket, just hop on and hop off all day long. Don’t forget, if you’re travelling at off-peak times or at weekends, you can now bring your bikes for free too on DART and Commuter, and travel even further.

So, your only problem now is – where do you go first?

SAVE WITH IRISHRAIL.IE Y

ou’ve always known that irishrail.ie is the place to go to get our best fares. Now, however, you can save on every single train journey.

For our cheapest fares on all trains on all routes on the national network, simply book online three or more days in advance.

No matter when you’re travelling, whether it’s a Bank Holiday weekend or a quiet Wednesday afternoon, the best fares will be available.

From Dublin to Cork and Kerry, you can travel for ¤19.99 each way.

Between the capital and Ennis, Galway, Limerick, Mayo and Sligo, it’s ¤14.99 each way. If your destination is Belfast, Nenagh, Rosslare or Waterford, you can travel for just ¤9.99 each way.

It pays to plan your travel, so book today!

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GONEWS

ARKLOW IS IRELAND S BEST STATION You voted in your thousands, and the results are in...

Presenting the Awards, Minister for Transport, Tourism & Sport, Dr. Leo Varadkar TD said: “Iarnród Éireann Best Station awards are an effective way of rewarding stations and staff that go the extra mile in promoting excellent customer service, cleanliness and good customer facilities.

The Award highlights the staff who strive to be to be as helpful as possible and do their best every day to ensure that passenger journeys are comfortable.”

The Minister continued: “It’s significant that the Best Station Award is decided by the travelling public, because it shows staff that they are appreciated, and it highlights the high standards available on the rail network.”

REGIONAL WINNERS Arklow also collected the title of Best Leinster Station, beating off competition from Kilkenny and Dundalk stations.

In Connacht, Ballinasloe emerged victorious.

Claremorris and Boyle Stations were also highly commended in the West.

Munster saw Killarney taking the top title, following on from their overall best station title for the last two years. Glounthaune and Thurles stations were highly commended by customers.

The Best DART station for 2012 was Clongriffin Station, beating Raheny and Sandycove/ Glasthule.

M3 Parkway was named Best Commuter Station for the first time, pipping Donabate and Skerries to the award.

Connolly Station also collected a special award for Best Customer Service. As a busy DART, Commuter and Intercity station in Dublin city centre, Connolly provides customer care of the highest standards.

SSTILL T U D ESAVE NTS IN SUMMER! School’s out for summer for third level students, but the savings continue Iarnród Éireann’s student seat sale has been extended!

For summer festivals, weekend breaks, or impulse travel, there’s savings to be had, with these fares on offer:

A

rklow Station in Co. Wicklow has been named Iarnród Éireann’s Best Station for 2012. The station plays a key role in the life of the Co. Wicklow commuter town and victory is all the more sweet as the winner was chosen by Iarnród Éireann customers.

Arklow came out on top in all four criteria of the text and email poll: Staff helpfulness, staff appearance, station appearance and customer information.

Dick Fearn, chief executive of Iarnród Éireann, said: “Winning the title of Best Station in Ireland

is a high honour and I congratulate Station Manager Marcin Zielinski and all his team at Arklow. Our customers are the most important part of our business so it is fitting that they should choose the winner of the Best Station Awards, and all the hard work in Arklow has certainly paid off.”

It was a proud station manager of Arklow and district, Marcin Zielinski, who collected the award on behalf of Arklow, along with colleague Eugene Breen. The magnificent crystal locomotive trophy was presented to Marcin and Eugene, and will adorn Arklow Station throughout 2012.

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ROUTE

STUDENT RETURN FARE

Dublin/Cork Dublin/Limerick Dublin/Waterford Dublin/Kerry Dublin/Galway Dublin/Westport Dublin/Sligo Dublin/Rosslare

¤30 ¤20 ¤20 ¤30 ¤20 ¤30 ¤20 ¤20

In addition, this special promotion will allow students to use their College ID cards to avail of these discount prices. Previously, students required a Student Travelcard to avail of discounted single and return Intercity fares (this card will also remain valid for discounts). More and more students are availing of these brilliant deals, so why not join the comfort movement?

GONEWS

ON TRACK ONLINE

Website and social media awards for Iarnród Éireann...

ON BOARD WI-FI Y GOES NATIONWIDE

WI-FI IS INTRODUCED ON ALL INTERCITY TRAINS

COMING SOON TO DART AND COMMUTER Iarnród Éireann has announced the completion of the process of equipping all of the company’s Intercity trains with free Wi-Fi

T

rain passengers can now use free wi-fi on all Iarnród Éireann intercity routes.

Following the successful trialing of the service on the Cork–Dublin line, some 234 intercity railcars have been upgraded for wireless internet access.

Routes include: • • • • • • • •

Dublin-Cork Dublin-Sligo Dublin-Mayo Dublin-Galway Dublin-Limerick Dublin/Cork-Kerry Dublin-Waterford Dublin-Rosslare

The availability of free Wi-Fi is an added bonus for rail customers already benefiting from a new, modern Intercity fleet, and an ‘every seat, every train’ web sale at www.irishrail.ie.

A spokesperson for Iarnród Éireann said, “One of the great benefits of rail travel is that you can use your travelling time productively, for work or leisure, and giving our customers free wi-fi only adds to this. Customers can use their smartphones, media devices, tablets, laptops and more while on their journey. Customers on the Intercity railcar fleet, which are now equipped with free Wi-Fi, also have plug sockets at every seat, so they can charge their devices as they travel for maximum convenience.”

Iarnród Éireann is also planning to introduce Wi-Fi on the DART and Commuter fleet during the summer of 2012, with the support of the National Transport Authority. Furthermore, the company is working with Translink to equip the Belfast Enterprise train with Wi-Fi by the end of 2012.

This will make the Iarnród Éireann fleet one of the most Wi-Fi friendly fleets in Europe, and is just the latest phase in service improvements from the rail company.

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ou know the old line about public transport, about waiting for ages and then three coming along at once? Well, Iarnród Éireann have had that experience in a very nice way recently, with three awards for their website and social media channels!

Firstly, the company won the Best State Body category for the redesign of irishrail. ie at the Ireland eGovernment Awards. They followed this up with being joint winners of Best Twitter Account (Support/CRM) for @irishrail along with @eircom at the Social Media Awards 2012, or #sockies in the Mansion House in Dublin.

On the same evening, they received word from web designers strata 3 that the redesign of www.irishrail.ie had won Best IT Project (Public Sector) at the ICT Excellence Awards in Dun Laoghaire!

From irishrail.ie to Facebook and twitter, Iarnród Éireann has embraced new channels to communicate with customers, and ensure you get information that helps you in planning and experiencing your journey in a user-friendly manner.

This is continuing to expand, with a new blog Railway Lines available at irishrail. ie/blog , which will give more insight into what goes on behind the scenes, and look at different aspects of the railway service.

Iarnród Éireann would also like to hear what you want to see on irishrail.ie and on social media channels.

Is there something they’re not providing that you want to see? What do you want more of or less of? Be sure to comment on any of these channels to let them know!

GOFEATURE

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THE TIME OF HIS LIFE He may be an internationally acclaimed comic who can play shows from Melbourne to New York but Meath native TOMMY TIERNAN tells PAUL NOLAN that his most enjoyable gigs are closer to home.

O

ne of the biggest live draws in Ireland, this summer finds Tommy Tiernan undertaking “world tours” of Sligo and Mayo, places the comic now finds the most satisfying to perform.

“Around 2008/2009 is when I really started doing Ireland properly,” considers Tiernan.

“What I mean by that is, doing it county by county. Before that, you’d have maybe a gig in Roscommon, then one in Tullamore and one in Cork. But around 2009, I said, ‘Okay, why don’t we go to Sligo, and see how many gigs we can get around the county?’ At the moment, I’m halfway through the world tour of Clare, where we’ve managed to get seven gigs in all, and we’ll have over two-and-a-half thousand people coming to the shows. I love it. I’m more excited about that now than I would be about doing gigs in New York or Melbourne.”

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Tiernan regularly travels to his gigs around Ireland by motorbike, and these days does his best to avoid the repetitive touring routine of airports and hotel rooms.

“I’m trying to put together some tours of North America and Melbourne at the moment, where I’d travel by car or train,” he explains. “For me, for a tour to work, there has to be something interesting other than the actual gigs. I’ve done these cross-continental tours where you’re flying all the time, and it’s soul destroying. The Irish tours are great, because I can spend two weeks down in Clare hopping from town to town, and pulling into places when I fancy a cup of tea, and I love that. I’m jealous of myself (laughs). I wish I was me!

“For the American and Australian tours, it would be vital that the mode of transport works.

Tom Waits used to have this line, he said, ‘Jet-lag is the depressed feeling you get waiting for your soul to catch up with you after you’ve travelled across the Atlantic.’ So your soul travels much slower than your feet.”

As opposed to, say, Jerry Seinfeld who mines comedic gold from the minutiae of everyday life, Tiernan remains a comic who likes to engage

GOFEATURE

I WAS WATCHING A MOVIE THE OTHER NIGHT AND THE OPENING SHOT WAS 13 MINUTES LONG.

MY WIFE, SHE CANNOT STAND

THE STUFF THAT I WATCH.

with the bigger topics.

“I’m finding stuff that I’m interested in, and that the room is interested in,” says Tommy. “There’s lots of stuff I’m interested in that I like the idea of myself talking about, but I find when I get in front of an audience, there saying, ‘No, move on.’ But I know that with religion, myself and the audience have common ground. I saw Noel Fielding do a great bit of material once about a fly, and I can say, ‘Wow, that’s brilliant, I’d love to do something like that – I’m going to do a thing about chickens.’

So I try and do a bit about chickens, and it’s not working.

“But I don’t fully decide it on my own. It’s a meeting point between me and the audience, it’s like any kind of conversation. For example, I can talk to my son about basketball, I can talk to my daughter about her best friend, and when I get in front of an audience, there are things which connect us. And they would find that they’d connect with another comic on different material.

With me, the subjects are usually religion, sex and family, and more recently, madness and Irishness.

“They’re the subjects that I connect to an audience with, but it’s not for the want of trying other topics. For whatever reason, when I get in front of an audience, if I start talking about Saint Patrick, the audience are going, ‘Yes – you talk about this.’ When Colin Murphy is in town, or Dara, or Des, they’re looking for something else, but with me, they’re going, ‘This is what works between us.’”

Is there a routine Tommy has come up with recently that he’s particularly happy with?

“I’m doing a segment at the moment, where I take an old folk tale that I’ve heard, and I’m doing a version of it,” he replies. “That would be something that I’m enjoying. I remember once, when I started performing in Vicar Street in about 2001 or 2002, and I don’t recall the name of the show, but I remember this feeling of, ‘What bit of material is next? Oh it’s that bit.’ And I was going, ‘Great. I really love performing it.’ It’s only with this tour that I’m starting to feel the same way again.

Previously, it was, ‘Okay, that bit’s coming up, how do I make it work?’ As opposed to just relaxing into it and going, ‘I really enjoy this bit.’”

What are Tommy’s plans for the rest of 2012?

“The world tour of Mayo, and the world of tour of Sligo,” he responds. “It doesn’t sound very glamorous. It’s very showband, very Joe Dolan. But I’m excited about it. It may not sound interesting to a lot of people, but like I said, four days in Sligo, done the right way, is much more interesting to me than a couple of nights in New York. And that probably sounds perverse, but I love it. The only other thing that I’m interested in creatively comes from me being a fierce fan of depressing Eastern European cinema. So at the moment I’m trying to put together a very depressing Eastern European short film based in Spiddal (laughs).

“I adore that kind of meditative cinema. I was watching a movie the other night and the opening shot was 13 minutes long. It might be part of getting back in touch with the natural ebb and flow of life. My wife, she cannot stand the stuff that I watch. But it’s funny, say you picture a comic up onstage, and he looks like great craic, you’d love to for a pint with him. Someone like Billy Connolly, he’s the life and soul of the party. Then you meet his tour manager, and you go, ‘Where’s Billy?’ And he says, ‘He’s up in the room, watching an eighthour Hungarian epic about Soviet agriculture.’ It might be just his way of reconnecting with himself.

He’s had a surplus of craic, and now he needs to suck some dry-bones, in order to get back in balance.”

Tommy Tiernan embarks on a World Tour of Mayo in August, before taking in Wicklow, Wexford and Waterford in September/October. See www. tommytiernan.com for details.

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AVAILABLE TO BOOK FOR PRIVATE GROUPS, HEN PARTIES, CHRISTMAS PARTIES, CORPORATE OUTINGS.

GOFEATURE

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O H

H A P P Y

DAY With a fourth album on the way and Hollywood calling, The Saturdays’ UNA HEALY tells CELINA MURPHY how she balances pop stardom with being a mum.

H

aving a new baby in the house is tough enough without having to worry about photo shoots, chat-show appearances, concert tours and the cagey gang of paparazzi lurking around the front door, but when you’re part of Britain and Ireland’s biggest girl band, it’s simply part of the job description. As the green-eyed beauty in pop phenomenon The Saturdays, Tipperary lass Una Healy is experiencing a different side to fame after giving birth to her first child with rugby-playing husband Ben Foden.

“Obviously, my whole life has changed now,” she tells me. “This little person is going to be dependent on me for the rest of my life. I have a daughter now, so it certainly does change overnight, but it’s all for the best, you know? I wouldn’t swap her for the world. I’m taking to it very well and she’s a very good little baby, so we’re thrilled with her.

‘The only problem I have with her is that she loves the hours from midnight to like, 4am. That’s her ‘up time’ and she just loves being wide awake! She’s like me like that, my mother was telling me that I used to be wide awake during those hours too, so she’s a night owl like me!”

Sleepless nights, late starts, early mornings; sounds like being a pop star was the perfect training ground for becoming a mum.

“I never grew out of it really,” Healy laughs. “I’ve always been a night owl!

I definitely function better in the evening and the night time than I do in the morning, so I don’t think I’d enjoy being a morning breakfast host!”

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GOFEATURE (left to right): Mollie, Frankie, Rochelle, Vanessa, Una

I DIDN T WANT TO LOOK PREGNANT IN THE VIDEO, IT HAS NO RELEVANCE TO THE SONG OR ANYTHING. Una won’t be sending her C.V. into Ireland A.M. anytime soon, which is probably for the best – she’s very clearly very smitten with the new arrival.

“I can see her change every day,” she says, “and it’s amazing to see the development. They grow up so fast! Even the way she looks at you, the little smiles and all that. They develop more and more every day, the little faces she pulls. I can’t wait till I start seeing all these changes like she starts to crawl, there’s so much to look forward to.

‘And she loves music!” she beams. “I think it’s probably because she was exposed to a lot of music while I was pregnant, she came on tour with me and everything. I remember I went in to record a song a week before I had her and a guy in the studio played it back and she was literally kicking the whole time while he was playing it! People were getting really excited about it, but it was probably just because it was a bit loud!”

Whether baby Aoife was enjoying a uterine rave, or merely responding to the hike in sound levels, it got Healy thinking about the emotional significance of music.

“If there was no music, there’d be no life, I don’t think,” she philosophises. “It’s so important.”

Just seven weeks after Una introduced little Aoife Belle Foden to the world, she was already

back on the job, plotting a jam-packed summer schedule, which included a date in her hometown of Thurles, and promoting The Saturdays’ new single, ‘30 Days’. It made sense that the song in question, the floor-filling first taster from the band’s forthcoming fourth album, was all about leaving the one you love behind.

“It’s about being apart from someone,” Healy explains, “counting down the days until you see them again and that’s very common for us, being away on tour. With Rochelle (engaged to JLS hunk Marvin Humes) especially, and Frankie too, with her boyfriend (footballer Wayne Bridge) playing sport and that, sport and music tend to take you away quite a lot. Either our boyfriends are away or we’re away!”

Healy has yet to reveal how she’ll cope with a temporary move to the States, where The Saturdays have just scored their own reality T.V. show on E! She’s used to being apart from her husband Ben, but tearing herself away from her little girl is another matter entirely.

“Even on my first day back with the girls, I was just constantly on my phone looking at pictures of the baby!” she recalls. “I was just staring at her all the time, I just can’t help myself! Then Rochelle said to me, ‘Oh, I know you’ve got the relevance

28

of ‘30 Days’ now’!”

Healy was determined to keep her baby bump out of the accompanying music video, which was filmed just one week before baby Aoife arrived, but a sneaky shot of her patting her tummy made it into the final cut.

“I didn’t see the point in me being pregnant in the video,” she hums, “but at the same time, it’s nice. It was part of the history of the band that I was pregnant during that time, so it’s just a little nod to that, really, I didn’t want it to be in peoples’ faces that I had a big bump. I thought, ‘This is my thing’, I didn’t want to look pregnant in the video, it has no relevance to the song or anything. There’s that little moment where I rub my belly and that’s enough. She’ll know that she was there.”

Given the copious column inches that Healy and her hair-flicking, hip-swinging band mates occupy, is she worried that some of the press glare will fall onto the newly-inducted sixth Saturday?

“I think everyone,” she says, before swiftly changing her mind, “all the fans were really supportive of my pregnancy, so there isn’t anything to criticise, really. It’s such a positive thing to have a little baby. It’s creating new life.

She’s going to be loved so much and I’ve been with Ben for a long time now, so it’s not like it’s coming out of nowhere or anything. I’ll always have my baby now. That’s life!”

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GOFEATURE

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THE CAT THAT GOT THE CREAM HANNAH HAMILTON reports on the places, people and pursuits that make KILKENNY one of Ireland’s favourite destinations.

K

ilkenny city in the heart of the sunny south-east is famous across Ireland for its stunning Norman castle, its allconquering hurling team and its popularity with stag and hen parties on the quest for craic agus ceol. But did you know it’s also a hotspot for riverside nature walks, boutique shopping, gourmet food, outdoor adrenaline sports and some of the finest art and craft in the country?

Whether you’re in town for an active family day out, an indulgent spa/shopping/scoffing weekend, a cultural tour with a few pints at the end of it, or any combination of the above, then the medieval Marble City has something unique to offer.

Arriving at MacDonagh train station, you’ll find yourself a ten-minute walk north of the city and one minute away from the MacDonagh Junction shopping centre where you can pop in to Treats

by Cramer’s Grove café in the Goods Shed annex for an emergency coffee or some Kilkenny-made ice-cream for that post-journey rejuvenation.

They have free wi-fi too, which is handy for online maps to get yourself orientated.

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OUTDOORS FUN Should you be lucky enough to have arrived on a nice day, you might want to take advantage of some of the area’s newest outdoor attractions.

The city was built along the banks of the River Nore, so what better way to see it than floating along on the current? Pure Adventure (www. pureadventure.ie) offers paddle boarding, canoeing and kayaking journeys that will take you 10km downriver to the picturesque village of Bennettsbridge. An alternative is to travel by bike. If you bring your own on the train, check out www.trailkilkenny.ie/cycling-trails/ for a wealth of routes, or you can rent a bike from Kilkenny Cycling Tours (www.kilkennycyclingtours.com).

Proprietor Jason will meet you off the train or at your accommodation with your bike, safety equipment and maps, and set you off on a twowheeled adventure. His ‘Bike and Hike’ tour also culminates at Bennettsbridge, where you can enjoy a hearty lunch at the reknowned Nicholas Mosse Pottery Studio. The return journey is on foot, courtesy of the Nore Valley Walk: a two hour, 11km walking trail that follows the river route back upstream through grasslands, river bank and roadways. See www.trailkilkenny.ie for

PureAdventure.ie

GOTRAVEL Tree top walk at Castlecomer Discovery Park

more details.

If you like a dose of adrenaline with your exercise, it’s worth checking out the Castlecomer Discovery Park (www.discoverypark.ie). This boasts walking trails, two fishing lakes, a café with the best sticky toffee pudding within county borders and a craft yard with studios and workshops inhabited by an array of local craftspeople, but it’s the latest additions to this recreational menagerie that’ll get the endocrine system pumping: a Tree Top Walk 10 metres above ground in the canopy, an outdoor climbing wall and a vertigo-inducing ‘Leap of Faith’, the details of which I will leave you in suspense over...

At 15km outside of town, you’ll need to take a bus (both Buggy’s and Bus Éireann offer services), otherwise a taxi is approximately €22. And don’t forget to pop in to the Dunmore Caves, which you’ll pass on the way, for some fabulous stalactites and stalagmites.

CULTURE & CRAFT If all that is a bit too energetic-sounding or if you’re looking for something more appropriate for small children, the Nore Linear Walk (starting on the Castle-side of John’s Bridge, near Kitty’s Cabin – an old-style sweet shoppe of the highest order) will take you down along the river and then the canal, from where you can slip through a secret entrance in the high stone wall into the grounds of Kilkenny Castle, known as the Castle Park. Rich with old specimen and native trees, a large pond with plenty of ducks, a roly-poly hill, a fantastic playground and a fountain in the Rose Garden that sprays you a bit when the wind blows, it’s lots of fun for small people (and the decent coffee in the outdoor café is pretty good for the big people, too).

It goes without saying that a visit to the castle is one of the finest historical and cultural experiences in the region and no trip to Kilkenny would be complete without it, likewise for St. Canice’s Round Tower and Rothe House. But, as well-known and established cornerstones of the Kilkenny tourist circuit, we shan’t dwell on them.

Instead, we suggest you just go, especially if you’re into history.

Across the road from the castle is the former stables, now home to the Design Centre: a shop selling quality locally-produced items and an upstairs café that transforms into an evening restaurant at weekends. Behind the design centre is the Castle Yard itself, in which you’ll find the National Craft Gallery and a number of independent workshops to explore, as well as Kilkenny’s only commercial art gallery, the recently relocated Blackbird (www.theblackbird. ie), home to a selection of the best of Irish craft as well as the créme of Irish and international fine art.

SHOPPING, DINNER & DRINKS If you’re in the mood for retail therapy, most of the major high-street brands are accounted for at MacDonagh Junction shopping centre, near the train station. But if it’s individual boutique style you’re after, head down John St. and over John’s Bridge to Rose Inn St. and adjoining Kieran St., where you’ll come across some of Kilkenny’s most quirky, quality shopping, courtesy of Lola Rose, the Butterslip, Kwilla, Serendipity et al.

While you’re in the area, be sure not to miss nearby William St. for Sabo Shoes and the Vintage Emporium, or Patrick St. for the Gift Horse and Yesterday’s.

Visiting a new city is always hungry work, and

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foodies in Kilkenny are in luck. Whereas ten years ago, one recalls the options of a) chicken or b) stew, today’s culinary offering couldn’t be better.

Among the array of lunch and dinner options vying for the honour of passing your lips, you’ll find the best in modern cuisine at Campagne, with Foodworks, Café Sol and Zuni also hitting high notes. Mocha upstairs on the High St. is great for to-die-for desserts and chocolate, while both The Yard and the Marble City Café on Kieran St. offer great coffee, friendly service and outdoor seating to watch the world go by.

For the digestif, you can’t do better than The Dylan – a whiskey bar on John St. – though Bridies, on the other side of the road, is an equally classy nightspot. It’s part of the Langton’s complex, as is The Set (www.set.ie): the place to look for gigs and comedy, and a central Arts Festival venue. For wine drinkers, seek out the thoroughly charming and well hidden Hole In The Wall (none more aptly named), for authentic decor and great Guinness, try Tynan’s near John’s Bridge or Lenehan’s on Barrack St., and for something a bit livelier, check out Ryan’s on Friary St. – they often have live music.

Set in 20 acres of extensive and award-winning landscaped gardens, just a ten-minute walk from the centre of Kilkenny, the Newpark Hotel, part of the Flynn Hotel Group (www.flynnhotels.com), is the perfect base for a fun-filled city break or for a relaxing getaway with great food, relaxing drinks and indulgent pampering treatments in their Escape Spa. If you want to sample some of what Kilkenny has to offer they are offering the Newpark Experience package (from €169pps) including three nights with breakfast, an afternoon tea, a visit to the castle and dinner in Campagne, one of the city’s best restaurants.

THE ARTS OF THE MATTER From Shakespearian comedy and historical lectures to Russian piano virtuosos and prizewinning synth poppers, it’s all going on in August at the Kilkenny Arts Festival.

A

lready renowned for its comedy festival, not to mention its long legacy of hurling prowess, Kilkenny has been quietly building its reputation as a haven for the arts. The annual festival has become one of the most eagerly-anticipated events in the sunny south-east and boasts an impressive and eclectic array of events.

Stunning on an average day, Kilkenny Castle will be transformed into a mystical hub of music and theatrics during the festival. The medieval fortress’ Parade Tower provides a magical and unique venue for some of the festival’s events.

In the grounds of the castle, Shakespeare fans will get a special opportunity to see a performance of As You Like It by Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre group. Performed outdoors in the Castle Yard audiences can witness one of the Bard’s best-loved comedies in a medieval setting. But if that doesn’t fulfill your Shakespearian needs worry not! Fintan O’Toole, author of Shakespeare Is Hard, But So Is Life, is at hand in the Watergate Theatre to discuss the life of the playwright and his mysterious relationship with his greatest rival Christopher Marlowe.

A literary talent closer to home is discussed in the Remembering John McGahern event in the Parade Tower. McGahern had the ability to convey human complexities and harsh Irish realities with vivid simplicity, making him one of the country’s most revered writers. McGahern challenged an authoritarian church and managed to combat censorship to create significant works that continue to inspire modern day authors. One such author is Brooklyn writer Colm Toibin who joins Denis Sampson and Anne Fogerty to explore McGahern and his works. A must-attend for fans and inspiring writers.

With artists, historians, opera singers and contemporary dancers all making an appearance at the festival deciding where to start can be a daunting prospect.

Fortunately the Kilkenny Arts Festival organisers have taken

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We often forget how impossible the concept of independence must have seemed to the people of Ireland when the third Home Rule bill was introduced in 1912.

It was designed to grant Ireland self-government within two years.

Home Rule was the overwhelming choice of most Irish nationalists, few could have imagined that by 1916 the situation would be irrevocably transformed. Historian Diarmaid Ferriter heads to Kilkenny to lead an interesting and informative discussion about the significance of the bill and the consequences of its failure.

Back in 2009 pianist Polina Leschenko delighted a Kilkenny audience with her phenomenal technique and deep sensitivity.

She returns this year and along with Ilya Gringolts, Nathan Braude and Thorleif Thedeen partakes in what promises to be a spellbinding evening of classical music in St. Canice’s Cathedral.

Exciting Irish musical talent is provided at the festival by Richie Egan’s indie, synth pop project Jape. It’s been an incredible year for the Dublin musician with his third album Ocean Of Frequency beating stiff competition to claim the coveted, and Egan’s second, Choice Music Award. The pintsized performer will pimp out the Set Theatre with all manner of synthesisers to produce his electronic pop creations for lucky punters, nothing beats a rendition of ‘Floating’ to get the arms waving and the feet tapping!

Think Kilkenny and black and amber, hurls and sliotars undoubtedly come to mind. So if you do want to take a break from the breathtaking list of events during the arts festival you can always head to one of Kilkenny’s lively pubs to soak up the atmosphere and have a chat to the locals about Henry Shefflin and the lads!

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GOFEATURE

34

Life After AFTER

With Westlife having parted ways after a marathon Croke Park send-off, the band’s KIAN EGAN looks back at 14 glittering years and outlines his plans for the future to COLM O’HARE.

A

fter 14 years together, much of it spent at the top of the charts, Westlife finally called it a day with two concerts in Croke Park, where they performed before 160,000 fans. It’s been a long but hugely successful career for the Irish boyband, masterminded and managed

by Louis Walsh and signed originally by Simon Cowell. They have sold over 40 million albums and enjoyed 20 top five hits, including 14 number ones. They have broken numerous industry records in terms of sales and live audience figures, and received literally dozens of industry accolades and awards. For Shane Filan, Nicky Byrne, Mark Feehily and Kian Egan, life will probably never be the same again.

“We ended our career in our national stadium, with our heads held high and all of our fans, family and friends around us,” Egan reflects, as he begins a new phase in his life.

“It was all about the four of us standing on that stage, singing those songs for those people, for the very last time. We’re never going to feel the same again as we felt in Croke Park. There’s no doubt about that.”

Surprisingly, he reveals that the band’s long-time manager, Louis Walsh, was less than happy about the decision to break up the band. “Louis didn’t want it to happen,” he states. “He understands why it needed to happen and why it should happen. But he just didn’t want it to happen and he was

35

very vocal about it. The four of us needed to make the decision for ourselves. Louis is not doing what we’re doing. He’s the manager.

He’s not on the road as much as we are, leaving families behind and living the lifestyle that we’re living.”

With Westlife now consigned to the history books, Egan says he has no immediate plans, although he hasn’t ruled out a solo career.

“I’m not too worried about what I’m going to do next. Whatever comes naturally comes naturally and if it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be. I have a few things in the pipeline which, if they come off, they come off. But my attitude towards it is, I’ve been in Westlife for 14 years, which is more than I ever imagined.

It’s been such a long time, especially for a boyband. From that perspective, I’m just kind of looking back and being grateful for what I’ve had. I don’t feel I’m in a position where I have to scrape the bottom of the barrel in order to remain in the public eye, or to look for my next paycheque. That’s not what it’s about for me. I’d prefer to sit at home and jam with my boys in the garage, in the little rock band that I jam with every now and again. And just to fall back into normality. I’m quite looking forward to the idea of that, just sitting around the house.”

Looking back over the 14 years the band were together, he remembers the very early days most fondly, as he relates. “I don’t think you’re ever going to beat the beginning of it all. The early years had a

GOFEATURE ‘wow’ factor. We were releasing amazing songs.

They were No. 1’s because they were great. It was successful because the music was really good.

For a boyband we made our mark on the world really quickly. By the time we got to our first Greatest Hits album, which was only our fourth LP, we’d sold 20 million records. That’s pretty insane. The next biggest rock band that comes along will hardly sell 20 million albums over their entire career if they’re lucky. Because the music industry has changed so much and record sales have come down. It isn’t the same industry that it used to be. From that perspective, it’s pretty aweinspiring that we actually accomplished all that.”

However, being young and new to the music

knew existed because I didn’t pay attention in school. It’s those kinds of things that make us look back and think, ‘we did amazingly well.’”

Westlife have sold more records than several major rock and roll groups put together, but given the nature of the boyband genre, they rarely received the kind of credibility or critical acclaim that other bands enjoyed. However, Egan insists that this didn’t bother him at all. “We are what we are and we don’t pretend to be anything else,” he states bluntly. “We’re not a rock band, we’re a pop band. We sing pop songs that are very well liked. It’s easy-listening music for the everyday person. We don’t make music for rock fans. We don’t make music for critics. We make music for

“SIMON COWELL WAS THE MAN WE ALWAYS HAD TO FIGHT AGAINST.” business meant he didn’t always appreciate the success he and his bandmates were enjoying, as he explains. “We were just going with the buzz of it all. It was a case of, ‘Wow, we’re in another country and there are twenty thousand fans at the gig’. We were going to countries I never even

the person who probably only buys two or three albums a year, if even. We’re for the everyday housewife, who likes to hear nice tunes that they can sing along to. Obviously, we did go through periods when we didn’t really understand it like that. But as life has gone on and our careers have

36

progressed, we know what we are, and we do what we do.”

He also insists that during their career Westlife didn’t always conform to what record companies, producers or management wanted — and even occasionally rebelled.

“Simon Cowell was the man we always had to fight against,” he explains. “A typical example was with ‘Rainbow Zephyr’, originally by (Downpatrick outfit} Relish. We loved the song, we loved the hook. Me and Mark were thinking, ‘This could be brilliant for Westlife’. We took it to Cowell and he was like, ‘No, no, no’. We said, ‘Just give us a chance’. Then we took it to Steve Mac and Wayne Hector, who wrote ‘Flying Without Wings’. We asked them to re-write the lyrics and make it more like a Westlife song. So, they went off and re-wrote the lyrics, and it became ‘Hey Whatever’.

We recorded it and slapped it on Simon’s desk and he just said, ‘I don’t like it, I don’t like it’. I stood up and said, ‘Well, we want it to be the first single from the album’. He said, ‘Really?’ We were like, ‘Yeah really’. So we released it and it did quite well. We shot a cool black-and-white video for it and it went in at No. 4 in the midweek charts in the UK. Cowell rang us up and summoned us into a meeting and he said, ‘Okay lads, I let you do ‘Hey Whatever’. I can see why you liked it and I can see why you wanted to do it’. There was another song on that album called, ‘On My Shoulders’ which we wanted to put out as a second single. But he just said, ‘if you put that out as the next single your career is over’.

We all went, ‘What?’ and he said , ‘I’m telling you now, nobody is going to buy it. This has been your weakest first week for any single you’ve ever released’. So we were scratching our heads. Up to then the first single off every album had been a No. 1 so we shit ourselves a bit and we went, ‘Okay, what should we do then?’ He played us

‘Mandy’ and said, ‘If you release this song as your next single, you’ll sell a million records’. So we recorded it and sold a million copies. We learned a lot from that. We were trying to do something that our audience wasn’t into and Cowell, being the genius that he was, realised this. I remember personally being a bit down about that for a while as I’d been the one pushing it.

There were several crisis during the band’s 14-year career, the biggest being the sudden departure of Brian McFadden in 2004. At the time Egan says he thought it would be the end of Westlife. “I remember ringing my mum when it happened and saying, ‘Well that’s it then, it’s all over now’. If you looked at other bands at the time, whether it was Take That or the Spice Girls, when anyone left the band, it had fallen apart or dwindled away. The difference with us, I suppose, was that Shane and Mark were the lead singers.

That made a huge difference. As did the fact that the four of us on stage were very strong. The tour had already sold out before Brian had left.

When we went on stage every night, we proved to the audience we were equally together as a four-piece.”

The decision to jump on the Rat Pack fad with an album of Sinatra and Dean Martin covers was another phase in the band’s career that he is less than proud of. “Well, let’s just say it wasn’t the favourite album in our career. But it got us over that period when Brian left. Then we came back with ‘You Raise Me Up’, which was our biggest hit of all time. After Brian left I think we managed to hold it together very well. We managed to keep ourselves at the top. However, it became a little bit more stressful and it wasn’t as free and easy anymore. We were getting wiser to the music industry, starting to understand how it worked and why we were being successful and how we were selling these records. We were always trying to do it over again and again and again.

When that happens, you lose the natural flow of things.”

When Mark Feehily went public about his homosexuality, there were some concerns that Westlife’s largely female audience might be affected. However, Egan says that particular episode was never a crisis for the band. “It was never a case of, ‘Oh my God what’s going to happen to us?’ That was a necessity for Mark’s happiness. Steven Gately had come out before that and Boyzone were still doing well. The whole taboo of a member of a boyband being gay and it ruining the band’s career had disappeared.

I don’t think there was any moment when we thought it was all over just because Mark was going to tell everyone that he was gay. It was completely fantastic that Mark got to come out like that. It made him a much happier person and it was the right thing for him to do.”

More recently, Shane Filan has been in the headlines concerning problems with his property investments and he has since been declared bankrupt in the UK. Does that kind of publicity have a disruptive effect on the band?

“It’s never affected us as a band and our fans have never reacted negatively to anything like that. We’re going through life like everybody else, except it’s in the public eye. In England it’s not as bad as it is here. And we spend 70% of our time in England so I never know what’s in the papers in Ireland. I’ve no interest – but I was home a good bit for The Voice and I’d go out for a coffee and pass by a shop and see all this stuff in the papers on us. And I’d think, ‘Jesus, Westlife are in the papers an awful lot’. I had no idea.”

The music business has changed dramatically since Westlife started out in the ‘90s. How does he feel about illegal downloading?

“I think it’s important that we protect the music as much as we can and that, as artists and people

Slayer & (above) Foo Fighters

in the public eye, we back these campaigns to make people aware of what’s happening. The problem is, the younger generation don’t really understand it. Take my 18-year-old brother, for example. He doesn’t know that the music industry is suffering and that illegal downloading is affecting the business. Or that the quality of albums is not as good, because record companies aren’t spending as much to make them. He just looks at it and goes, ‘Well why would I buy something if I can get it for free?’

To the younger generation that makes complete sense. I know if I was 18, I’d be thinking the exact same thing. As I said, it’s important that people who do what I do make it common knowledge that it does affect the business.”

Earlier this year Egan showcased yet another side to his talents when he found himself as a judge and coach on The Voice, RTÉ’s popular talent show. How did that happen? “Larry Bass [the producer] just rang me up and asked if I was interested,” he explains. “I knew at the time what was going on with Westlife and I thought it was a good opportunity for me to stick my finger in another pie and do something I enjoyed, and that I thought I’d be okay at. I really did enjoy it and I’d like to think that I’d do a second season, if that ever happens.”

Did you get on well with the other coaches?

“There was a good bit of tension with me and Brian Kennedy at the start. I think Brian had a big question-mark as to why I was there, ‘from a vocal perspective’, as he would put it. As far as I was concerned, I had every right to be there. I know exactly what it takes to establish a career in the music industry. I could never understand why he was questioning why I was there. I think we kind of resolved it in the end and we’re good mates now.”

Despite the demise of Westlife, Egan says the four former band-mates will remain friends and will continue to stay in touch.

“We probably feel closer now than ever, because the weight is off our shoulders and the pressure is gone. We’re genuine friends. But as the years have gone on, it’s become a more stressful job. The most important thing is that we come away with our friendships intact. We’ll probably see each other every few months if not every few weeks. We’ll all do our own thing as well.”

37

HARD ROCK

OF AGES While Kian Egan is known to the public as a smooth-voiced singer in a successful boy band, he reveals that in private he is a rocker at heart!

“The Foo Fighters’ latest album is probably my favourite at the moment,” he reveals. “I went to see them last year in Milton Keynes and was jumping up and down like every other lunatic in the middle of the pitch. I grew up listening to heavy metal: Pearl Jam, Guns N’ Roses, Metallica, Iron Maiden, Slayer and Megadeth. System Of A Down is another one I listen to a lot recently. I’m a rocker. I’m a Nirvana-head. That’s what I grew up listening to. That’s what I’ve always listened to.”

GOFEATURE

38

SHALL INHERIT THE EARTH The Booker-nominated author PATRICK DeWITT discusses literary acclaim, the merits of writing for the page versus the screen and why, for him at least, gritty moral complexity trumps black-and-white simplicity every time.

P

atrick DeWitt’s Booker-nominated The Sisters Brothers is the tale of two hired assassins in Goldrush-era America which follows the pair on a life-altering assignment.

The tome has been the recipient of a slew of literary awards and has catapulted the young Canadian from relative anonymity to global notoriety.

His earlier novel Ablutions garnered positive nods in literary circles. He received further acclaim when celebrated director Azazel Jacobs made his screenplay Terri into an international success starring revered actor John C. Reilly.

Reilly has also optioned The Sisters Brothers and the wheels are in motion for its translation to the silver screen.

When we catch up with the quietly-spoken author he is in town to take part in the Dublin Writers Festival and his appearance is one of the schedules highlights. The Sisters Brothers is exceptional in that it is essentially a story about two killers but is remarkable in its humanity and ability to create a sympathy between the reader and the characters. Painting the brothers as somewhat fragile and damaged he eschews the stereotype of the cold-hearted killer.

“I find when personalities in films or novels are very black-and-white I tend to lose interest as a viewer or reader, it seems like real life is more complicated than that,” he explains. “I have never known any purely bad or purely good people and it just seemed like more of a challenge to try to humanise complicated people as opposed to just painting someone as heroic. It’s really just a question of maintaining interest, when things become cut and dried in my own work I tend to lose interest.”

“It takes a lot of energy to work on a long project and that needs to regenerate every day,” he continues. “So when plot and characters are in flux it’s more absorbing. Eli, for example, is a

little bit of everything, much more fascinating to spend time with. It’s the same socialising, people who are really kind and always have a kind word are fine to spend time with but it’s not nearly as interesting as someone who has ups and downs.

It’s more interesting for me to go through a range of emotions and deeds.”

The contrasting discipline of writing a screenplay was one DeWitt struggled with, Azazel came across the story of Terri in an unfinished novel DeWitt had given him to read.

The author credits the innate restrictions of the form with the success of Terri.

“They are very different, fiction is much more expansive and you can really do anything you want to,” he says. “Whereas with screenwriting there are some really rigid rules and guidelines that you have to go by, for example at this point in the story something really should happen, that was off-putting at the start. Terri was my first screenplay but as I got into it I found the rules almost made it like a puzzle and it was actually kind of fascinating. It was also maddening at times because with a book you don’t really need to have a conclusion. It can just sort of end! I remember the end of Terri was really difficult and unpleasant, I was pulling my hair out. But I think these rules turned up something in the story, if the rules had not been there it would have been such a different project. I am happy with the end result so I owe it to the rules for guiding me towards what now is the film.”

Currently on a literary residency in Paris with his wife and young son DeWitt has found himself between two projects. He has recently abandoned the contemporary tale of a corrupt investment banker to concentrate on a dark fable about a young man who moves to a remote monastery.

“The guideline for me generally is that if something is dragging and I’m not having a

39

good time I tend to become overly critical,” he says. “I was struggling with the investment advisor story so for the time being I have stepped away and I am working on the fable.

It is a nasty story but it is a lot of fun and has my full attention right now. In terms of what is going to be the next novel I am not really sure but one of the two things will win out.”

In all critiques of his writing, particularly for Ablutions, DeWitt has most often been compared to Charles Bukowski. The author himself has resisted these associations citing the latter’s writing as inherently masculine and his own as sexless.

“I don’t feel any aesthetic kinship with most of the authors that people think I do,” he counters.

“I think being compared to other writers is just something that people do in order to get a dialogue started or just to generally reference what you’re dealing with. I don’t think it’s unfair or overtly incorrect to compare Ablutions to Charles Bukowski because it is a story about alcoholism and Hollywood so there is going to be some overlap, but he was someone that was never in my mind in my writing of that book.”

“In terms of gender, generally speaking I am not a macho guy and my sympathies don’t really lie with any one group that’s what I mean when I say sexless,” he explains. “I prefer the company of women to men socially and I always have, I have never been a guy’s guy. I also think I bristled against the Bukowski comparison as I don’t want to be one of those authors that have a really intense male readership and women won’t want to read my work. The idea of women not reading my books is horrific to me so I try to avoid that. I would hope that anyone can read my work and not feel alienated.”

I think the million or so readers who bought the book would heartily concur.

The Sisters Brothers is out now through Ecco.

GOFEATURE

40

OLYMP AN FEATS With the London Olympics in full swing, COLM O’HARE and ED POWER talk to some of Ireland’s medal hopefuls, marathon runners AVA HUTCHINSON and LINDA BYRNE and boxer JOHN JOE NEVIN.

G

iven the enormous appetite for sport in Ireland, the Olympics always generates huge interest around the country. Of course, with the event taking place so close to home in London, the 2012 Olympics has attracted perhaps even more attention here than usual – and in June, we had the unique experience of the Olympic torch being taken on a short tour of the country by some of our leading sports stars.

In terms of Irish medal hopes, boxing once again leads the way. This is traditionally one of Ireland’s strongest areas and older readers may recall our stellar showing 20 years ago in Barcelona, when Michael Carruth claimed a gold medal and Wayne McCullough a silver.

At Beijing in 2008, there were medals for Kenny Egan (silver) and Paddy Barnes and the late, much-missed Darren Sutherland (bronze). Barnes

41

is again among Ireland’s leading medal hopes in 2012, but perhaps Ireland’s leading contender for gold is Katie Taylor.

Earlier this year, the Bray boxer claimed her fourth successive world title in China, which guaranteed her top seeding in the lightweight division in London and a bye into the quarterfinal. The aforementioned Barnes will also be hoping for further success in the flyweight division.

Go Rail talks to another boxing contender, John Joe Nevin – who got off to a powerful start in his opening fight – and also to women’s marathon runner Ava Hutchinson. Elsewhere, Peter O’Leary and David Burrows (sailing) and Derval O’Rourke (100m hurdles) are also among the medal hopefuls on Ireland’s 60-strong team. Overall, it’s sure to be a hugely enjoyable festival of sport, with the usual quotient of incident, spectacle and – of course – remarkable achievement. Enjoy.

GOFEATURE

W

ith a 60-strong Irish Olympic team competing in 14 separate events, London 2012 promises to be an exciting occasion in what will effectively be a ‘home’ Olympics. While there are numerous medal hopefuls and one or two near-certainties, according to the pundits, one of the toughest and most challenging events is sure to be the Women’s Marathon. With over a hundred participants, the odds on winning a medal are of course far steeper than in other sports, while it’s also one of the few events to be staged offsite and open to the public free of charge.

With a route starting (and ending) in St. James Park, running along the Thames Embankment, through the City of Westminster and back again, it promises to be one of the most spectacular as far as the public is concerned with an expected audience of hundreds of thousands.

Ava Hutchinson (inset), the fastest of the four Irish marathon women qualifiers was born in Blackrock, Co. Dublin, but was raised in Hamsphire after the family moved there for work reasons (her father Colman, a former researcher with The Late Late Show, moved to British TV, working for ten years with Chris Tarrant on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?). Despite being based in the UK, Hutchinson has always run for Dundrum South-Dublin and is currently based at Loughborough University. Coached by Ray Treacy from Providence College in the US, she won the 2011 Irish half-marathon.

“It was always my ambition to try and make it to the Olympic Games and now that I’m there I’m going to enjoy the experience as much as I can,” she says. “My goal is to be the top Irish runner and to beat my own personal best. But everyone will go into it with different aspirations.

"It’s a very tough event and it favours older, more experienced athletes. A lot of the women who qualified are around 35 and older. I think the winner of the women’s marathon at the last Olympics was around 38, so it really is about experience.”

Her preparations for London included ten weeks of training in the heat in Providence Rhode Island in the US. “Training is important but you can only prepare yourself so much and a lot of things can happen during the race itself,” she says. “The weather is unpredictable but London can be very hot and humid in the summer,

which is why I’ve trained in a warm climate. I’m mainly looking forward to being there – it’s an achievement in itself to take part.”

Linda Byrne (above right) qualified for London 2012 by winning the Dublin Marathon (in a time of two hours, 36 minutes, 23 seconds) while she also won this year’s Dublin Mini Marathon. Like Ava, she is a Dundrum South Dublin athlete. “It has always been my dream to compete in the Olympics,” she says, during a break from training in the heat in Portugal.

“I started off running when I was eight years old, competing in different events and then I joined the local club. When I started doing crosscountry running, my coach noticed that I was consistent and I started running marathons.”

Like Ava, her training schedule included a long session in the heat in Portugal. “I’ve been running around 80 to 90 miles a week, including two hard running sessions and one or two gym sessions,” she explains. “I wouldn’t mind a bit of rain on the day but it’s the heat that you sometimes get in London that might be a problem. The weather has been all over the place recently, so I’ll just have to wait and see what happens. As far as diet is concerned, I try to eat healthy, nutritious balanced meals, three times a day.”

Despite her impressive achievements in qualifying she is under no illusions about the task ahead of her. “It’ll be very tough, there’s no doubt about that. There are a lot of African runners in the Marathon and everyone knows they are among the best performers historically. But I know I can better my personal best and that’s what I’m aiming for.”

She also did a bit of advance research, checking out the course, as she explains.

“I actually went over to London recently to have a look at the course. I rented a bike with a friend and we went around it, which took us an hour-and-a-half, even on bikes (laughs). But of course there was traffic on the streets at the time. The race itself is on a Sunday morning so there should be huge crowds around.

Apart from London 2012, Byrne says she will use the experience to look towards the future.

"I’m just turning 26 this year so I would be aiming for Rio in 2016 and maybe even the one after that. It’s a huge honour to be representing your country and with only about 60 in the Irish team, it’s quite a small number who get to qualify every four years, so I’m very grateful to be there.”

42

WE NEED TO TALK

ABOUT NEVIN One of the most talked-about amateur exponents of pugilism in the world, at the age of 22, John Joe Nevin is ready to take that big career leap, and potentially to turn pro. As steps on the way to that goal go, they don’t come much bigger than competing in the Olympics.

John Joe’s been there and done that before, reaching the Beijing Olympics as a teen. He qualified for London 2012 at the AIBA World Boxing Championships in Baku last October, reaching the semis before bowing out with bronze to England’s Luke Campbell, off the back of a contentious decision.

Looking back at 2011, Olympic qualification takes precedence, but a nomination alongside the likes of Katie Taylor for ‘RTÉ Sportsperson of the Year’ must have been the cherry on the cake.

“It was a big deal. It shows that I’m getting recognised for what I’m doing and that I’m up there with the best. And I’d know Katie well alright. We’d train together at the IABI High Performance Unit. We often spar together and we’ve been away together on many trips.”

There have been disappointments too, often owing to contentious decisions. After a controversial win on countback for Luke Campbell at the World Championship semifinals in Azerbaijan, Nevin said, “This game can be cruel”.

“Yeah it can", he says now, "but I’ll can just train harder, get my head down and get him back in the main one... When I went to the last Olympics I was 18 years old, I was only a baby.

I was very cocky, you know how teenagers are!

Now I’ll be one of the big guns, so if I bring my A game to the ring I can beat anyone.”

Aside from representing your country, you’re also representing your community. How does being a role model for young travellers sit with you?

“There’s many young travelling boxers going to clubs now and hopefully they’ll look up to me. Hopefully they can achieve more than I’ve achieved. Keep them off the street. It’s better than this bare knuckle stuff. Stay in the sport.”

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GOSPORT

BROGAN S RUN FOR THE CURRENT CROP OF DUBLIN FOOTBALLERS, 2012 COULD BE A DEFINING YEAR. BERNARD BROGAN TELLS EAMONN SEOIGE WHY THE SKY’S THE LIMIT FOR THE SKY BLUES.

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L

ast year’s last-gasp All-Ireland win over Kerry was a pivotal moment for Gaelic football in the capital. It brought an end to many years of hurt for the sky-blue faithful, summers of epic near misses and heartbreaking defeats.

Last September, Pat Gilroy’s rejuvenated Dubs finally delivered on their huge promise to land the county’s first Sam Maguire in 16 years. Next up, they’ve an even bigger challenge. Winning Sam is one thing, retaining it is a whole other ball game.

There are many reasons why so many have tried and failed to match Kerry’s back-to-back wins of ’06 and ’07, the only brace of the last 20 years.

Whatever element of surprise Dublin’s disciplined, high-tempo game-plan had is well and truly gone.

Whilst in past years Cork, Tyrone or Kerry have been the benchmark, Brogan & Co. are now the team everyone’s gunning for. Winning an All-Ireland in the modern era requires massive dedication to the cause. The huge demands placed on amateur players means it’s becoming ever more difficult to keep a hold on Sam. Dublin would dearly love to do the business all over again, but their celebrated inside forward Bernard Brogan is under no illusions as to the size of the task.

“I don’t think the pressure’s quite the same this year,” Brogan notes. “The Dublin supporters seem more relaxed. We’ve got that monkey off our backs and have proven to ourselves we’re good enough

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GOSPORT

by winning our first All-Ireland for years. There’s no doubt that it’s going to be extremely hard to retain it, but we’re up for the challenge.”

After a winter of well-earned celebration, Dublin were brought back down to earth after an inconsistent National League campaign saw them narrowly missing out on the knock-out stages. A wonderful Croke Park demolition of fancied Donegal was followed by a 12-point hammering at the hands of Mayo. It was the wake-up call they badly needed.

“It can be very hard to maintain that level of focus. At times, we were a little flat in the league, but Pat has worked hard to make sure we keep our eye on the ball and he’s brought in some new faces, lads who’ll push very hard for inclusion. The panel needed it and it’s really helped to up the intensity in training. That’s the kind of competition from within that drives lads on, it’s really about continuing to get the most out of yourself. We’re going to need to work so much harder this summer if we’re going to have any chance of putting back-to-back titles together. Even a small dip in form, in that intensity and you’re gone! Pat has created a very tight unit within the Dublin panel and he’s always encouraged togetherness. All the players get on well and on the rare opportunity we get a chance, we socialise together. The banter’s good and it’s so important to get on. Your teammates are almost like another family!”

Gaelic football has undergone a mini-revolution in recent years, as physical and tactical preparation has reached dizzying levels. Modern

inter-county is certainly an unforgiving business.

“Donegal have raised the bar with their fitness and defensive game-plan. People thought our morning sessions were taking things to a new level, but Jim McGuinness’s panel are supposedly training 12 times a week! That’s the level of commitment now required to compete. Teams are doing as much training as professional sportsmen and nowadays, the lessons of sports science are taken into account. Players are taking great care with their diets. In order to reach that level, you have to be prepared to make some serious sacrifices. I love it, the preparation is challenging, but the reward of representing your county in Croke Park makes it totally worthwhile.

“The blanket-defence is certainly difficult to play against, I don’t love it, but every team will do whatever it takes to get the right result. Some coaches still prefer a more orthodox 15-on-15, but it’s becoming less common. Management will play to their relative strengths and it’s about being prepared for every eventuality.

When we scraped past Donegal last summer, we had to really knuckle down to just get past them. They’re back again this year and look an improved side. There’s a slight variance to their defensive system, defending deep and then employing a fast-breaking attacking style. They will take some serious stopping this year.”

So, who’s going to be in the shake-up in 2012?

Whilst the main contenders of Cork, Kerry, Dublin, Mayo and Donegal are obvious, even the very best can get caught out by lesser lights.

“There are a lot of teams in with a real shout

PEOPLE THOUGHT OUR MORNING SESSIONS WERE TAKING THINGS TO A NEW LEVEL, BUT JIM MCGUINNESS’S PANEL ARE SUPPOSEDLY TRAINING 12 TIMES A WEEK!

46

this year and even when a big name gets beaten, there’s always the second chance of the backdoor. Everyone knows who the main challengers are, but it’s really about taking each game in isolation. It’s one step, one game at a time, looking too far ahead is a dangerous business.

There are plenty of teams capable of catching Dublin and the other main contenders if we don’t perform up to standard. Complacency is not a place you want to be!”

After a disjointed, injury-interrupted early season, Bernard’s back on track and chomping at the bit. Backs, you’ve been warned!

“I’m relatively happy with my form at the moment. I missed out on a lot of the winter training due to some niggly injuries for the first time in six years and I could probably have done with more league football to sharpen me up. I was a little rusty coming into the championship, but in recent times, playing club football has been of huge benefit. I feel like I’m not far off my best, but in order to compete you need to be 100%. There are some really excellent defenders in the game at the moment; Kevin Reilly of Meath is top-class, Kildare’s Michael Foley is a brilliant player, but for me, Marc Ó Sé is probably the best from the last decade. He’s lightningquick, reads the game so well and he rarely buys a dummy!”

Even the very best need some advice from time-to-time. And there’s no prizes for guessing who’s helped mould Brogan – who is junior to his father, GAA All Star Bernard Brogan snr – into an All-Star winning inside forward.

“My dad’s obviously been a hugely positive influence on my career,” he nods. “As a player, I’d have to also say that my club-mate at Oliver Plunkett’s, Jason Sherlock, has been a great influence. Jason has always given me pointers and has helped me to focus on my game.

He’s still a great sportsman, a real example to younger kids on how to behave on the pitch. Jason has excelled at Gaelic, soccer and basketball and is a fantastic athlete. I’ve certainly benefited from playing club football with him, it’s been a great learning experience.”

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GOBUSINESS

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W E A V I N G

S U C C E S S

A T

A V O C A

They’re the Irish success story that have built an instantly recognizable brand and weathered the recession. SIMON PRATT of Avoca talks about the company’s remarkable rise to COLM O’HARE

I

t doesn’t take very long to figure out that Simon Pratt, managing director of Avoca Handweavers, is a hands-on kind of guy when it comes to his management style. As he walks around the busy retail floor of the company’s headquarters and flagship store in Kilmacanogue, Co Wicklow, he can’t help re-arranging displays, hanging a sweater on a rail, even picking up a discarded receipt from the floor. He stops frequently to chat to employees, holds the door open for customers and fetches his own coffee. “Retail is detail,” he smiles, settling into a corner of the spacious Fern Restaurant, one of the many attractions at the sprawling 12-acre site at the foothills of the Sugar Loaf Mountain. “I haven’t worked out a better way to do it. You need to be involved on the ground in a business like this. You need to micromanage and to be aware of everything that happens on the floor.”

His approach certainly seems to work. The family business, which specialises in the finer things in life, from gourmet food to designer fashions and locally made crafts, now employs 600 people at 10 locations throughout Ireland and has an annual turnover of €60 million. (The Avoca group also operates the award winning Mount Usher Gardens at Ashford in Wicklow – voted by the viewers of BBC’s Gardiner’s World as one of the top three gardens to visit in Ireland.)

Even in the teeth of recession, Avoca has been in expansion mode of late and has recently opened outlets in Monkstown in South Dublin and at the Brown Thomas store in Cork, with plans to open in Malahide Castle later this year.

“One of the reasons we are prepared to expand in this market is the fact that there are some good deals out there when it comes to retail sites, “he explains. “We mix it about, in terms of properties, in that we operate some freehold and

49

some leasehold properties. Freehold is expensive and absorbs a lot of capital but ultimately you own them and, as a family business, it’s a nice thing to be able to do. But if you just did freehold you’d never be able to expand at any speed. So there are definitely some benefits to the recession but at the same time it’s coupled with so many other negative things.”

The origins of the company date back to 1723 to an old Mill in Avoca Village but the Pratt family involvement is much more recent, as he explains. “My parents bought it in 1974 – my father was a solicitor and my mother was a school teacher and the Mill was almost defunct. They set about restoring it - it’s now the oldest surviving mill in the country as well as being a really good visitor attraction.” The Kilmacanogue site, based in what was the grounds of Glencormack House, a former home of the Jameson family, was he says, chosen for its closer proximity to the capital. “In the early days when my parents were trying to encourage wholesale buyers to come and see the product, Avoca village was too far out. The idea of locating here is that it was a half-way house between Avoca and Dublin.

The location has proved to be a winner and its proximity to the wealthier suburbs of the capital has ensured its reputation as the place where the “ladies-who-lunch” and the “yummymummies” of South County Dublin are known to congregate. “Ours would be a reasonably affluent clientele, that’s definitely true,” he agrees. “But we’re not pitched at a very high price point either and everyone is welcome.

Women from 25 to 75 are probably the key customers for us and they’ll bring along family members or friends, or they’ll meet someone after they’ve dropped the kids off to school. But it’s a male friendly environment too - a lot of men are interested in food anyway and we offer some men’s fashions.”

Avoca’s throws and blankets are world renowned, while the food halls, cafes, homewares section and garden centre have all proved

GOBUSINESS

Laois Shopping Centre

The origins of the company date back to 1723 to an old Mill in Avoca Village but the Pratt family involvement is much more recent, as he explains. “My parents bought it in 1974 – my father was a solicitor and my mother was a school teacher... enduringly popular, especially with weekend day trippers. Even during the current recession, Pratt says business is holding up surprisingly well. “Like everyone else we’re not immune from the downturn but we’re not interested in going down the road of discounting. We’ve always stuck with the quality mantra and we buy the very best of Irish artisan food products. We design a lot of products ourselves too – whether it’s soaps or ceramics.

“People still need to meet and have lunch or to stop for a coffee or whatever; it’s been an important part of the model. People still want to have some time out. And when they do come in for a coffee, we try to sell them something to take home for the evening – whether it’s an apple pie or something for tonight’s dinner.”

The continuing success of the Avoca brand is, he says, also down to the loyalty of their core customers over the years. “The local business is important to us and it accounts for in the region of 90% of our business.

We’ve never been in the business of pitching ourselves as something

aimed at tourists. When you go abroad you want to go somewhere where the locals go. There’s nothing I like more than to go to Italy and see a place full of locals – you know you’re onto something good. When I go to a place full of tourists my antennae goes up. We’ve always aimed at Irish people and if the tourist market likes what we do – that’s a bonus.”

Avoca remains very much a family affair - his parents are still involved in the business, as are a brother and two sisters. “It’s very hard work and it absorbs an awful lot of your time,” Pratt reflects. “It’s a seven day a week business. Our busiest days are Saturdays and Sundays, so you can’t just saunter in on a Monday morning and ask how things went over the weekend - you have to be around.”

The immediate future is looking very bright for Avoca, as he concludes: “Our Monkstown cafe and food hall has proved to be very successful and I would like to open a number of those kinds of outlets in the suburbs. That’s something we might look at over the coming years.”

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GO DESTINATION: GALWAY

LOVE OF COUNTRY TONY FENTON, one of the country’s most beloved DJs, is a railroad romantic with a particular fondness for countryside views.

“M

y favourite thing about going on a train journey is the train station.

People-watching at the train station,” says legendary Today FM DJ Tony Fenton.

“I play this game where I try to guess the occupation of people in train stations. I try to come up with cool and mysterious jobs for people.”

So has he ever given into curiosity and approached any of the pawns in his boredombusting game?

“Once!” he laughs. “I saw this guy and guessed he worked for the CIA, he had those American pants on! So for a bet, I went up and asked him what he did. He was an American, but he was a green grocer!”

Train stations for Fenton are more than just places to speculate about unsuspecting passersby. Indeed, he admits to a somewhat romantic view of train stations, and enjoys the old-school Hollywood depictions of the platform.

“Train stations are very mysterious, very magical,” he enthuses. “They hold a lot of romance because of those movies years ago with couples parting by the train tracks, waving goodbye and all that.”

In Germany last year, Fenton witnessed a moment that reaffirmed his romantic notions.

“I was about to board a train heading from Berlin to Leipzig,” he remembers. “I witnessed that romance - I thought I was in a movie set! A girl was saying goodbye to a guy, the guy was getting on the train and the girl was waving goodbye in floods of tears.

"You always imagine that happening in train stations and in airports where people are saying goodbye to loved ones, but you never actually witness it. Train stations for me are all about that magic, that mystery, that romance - and that incident was amazing to witness.”

Fenton has fond memories of his first solo adventure on a train.

“The journey was from Dublin to Galway - from Heuston Station to Eyre Square. I think I was about 18. I was doing a gig in a nightclub in Salthill and it was my first time playing a venue outside Dublin.”

Alone, armed only with two boxes of records and a sense of apprehension over how he’d keep his Galwegian audience engaged, the journey was a special one for the DJ. “I’d only been collecting records for about a year-and-a-half and I’d probably done about ten gigs at this stage, maybe 20, so I thought, ‘Oh man I’ve hit the big time and I’m gigging outside Dublin.’ Ten people showed up!” he laughs. “And I was one of the ten!”

Despite the poor turnout, Fenton enjoyed the journey to the west. For a teenager who grew up in Dublin city, the train journey offered some interesting sights.

“Cows! The amount of cows that we have in Ireland is incredible, we’ve got a lot, do you know that?!” laughs Fenton. “I didn’t really get to see cows, so along the way on the journey it was

like, ‘Wow, every field has got cows!’ And also realising how beautiful our countryside is. We have stunning countryside but you don’t get to really see it unless you're flying over it or passing through it on a train.”

Years after his first Galway gig and with over 35 years on air on national radio, Tony Fenton is a household name up and down the country, albeit on radio where his face isn't visible. So do people recognise and approach him on trains, or does he manage to pass by unnoticed?

“People do outside of Dublin. If I’m in the country in Galway, Cork or Connemara, people always come up and say hello. I think Dublin people are just too cool. In Galway people have come up to me saying things like, ‘It’s great to have you in the west. Fair play to you for making the trip down!’ People are very welcoming.”

When it comes to travelling, Tony is a man of simple pleasures, preferring to equip himself with just a bottle of water or an occasional cup of tea from the food cart. Train journeys provide him with the opportunity to relax and revert into his own little world.

“I don’t tend to work a lot on the train, I don’t open a laptop or text people,” he notes. “I don’t

51

think, ‘Oh this is an hour journey on the train so I’ll do a bit of business for the hour.’

Whereas some people enjoy chatting to different characters on the train, Fenton is content with his own company.

“I went on a train journey from Cork to Dublin seven or eight years ago and I got stuck beside someone who recognised me and wanted me to do a fundraiser for them,” he remembers.

“He went on for an hour and although when he started it was a bit of fun, it turned into a painful hour for me!”

Given that he is not a texter, talker or worker when enjoying the rhythmic chug of the train on the tracks, how does Fenton generally pass the journey?

“I like to take in whatever is around me,” says the DJ, before referring again to the scenic views afforded by rail travel.

“I like to take in the countryside, which you don’t get to do while you’re driving because you're concentrating so much. On a train you get to see how beautiful it is.”

Tony Fenton is on Today FM 2.30pm – 4.30pm Monday to Friday.

GOEAT

52

ELAINE & ABLE

TV3 presenter Elaine Crowley discusses life in the media fast lane over a scrumptious meal in Dublin’s finest French restaurant, Les Frères Jacques.

WORDS Stuart Clark PHOTOS Katie Stenson

“S

orry for being late, it’s really rude of me!” Elaine Crowley is apologising for arriving just five minutes after our agreed rendezvous time in Les Frères Jacques, Dublin’s oldest and in many people’s opinion – including mine – best French restaurant. Located a few doors up from the Olympia Theatre, it’s a veritable oasis of Gallic sophistication in an area largely populated by fast food joints.

look so fresh you suspect they started the day splashing around in either the Irish Sea or the Atlantic.

Suitably impressed, Elaine goes for the seared scallops with mild curry mash and light creamed fish fumet followed by whole grilled black sole meunière – a house specialty – while being in more carnivorous mood I opt for the chicken breast with shredded white cabbage, honey, soya & sesame oil dressing and crispy seared duck magret with sweet & sour cranberry.

Who was the cook in the Crowley household when Elaine was growing up?

“My dad, who did simple Irish food really, really well – things like beef and lamb stew, bacon & cabbage and smoked haddock, which was a big favourite of mine. We’d rob peas from the field next door and away you’d go. Our butcher had a farm across the road, so any meat we bought was fresh and organic – not that the term ‘organic’ was used back then.

You just knew everything was free-range and humanely reared.

“There were ten of us, so meal times were done in three different shifts. Both of my parents were primary school teachers, so it was the babies and primary school lot first; the secondary school lot second and the grown-ups last. There were so many things you couldn’t get back then. It was nine before I encountered coleslaw for the first time and thought it was the best thing ever. As for a Chinese or Indian in Mallow, forget about it!”

Did Elaine watch and learn from her dad or was moving away from home for the first time a shock to the culinary system?

“I did my Leaving Cert at 16, arrived in Dublin when I was 17 and for my first year there lived on tuna and pasta with sweetcorn. You’d think you couldn’t go wrong with Donegal Catch but, no, mine was burned on the outside and still frozen inside. I’m slightly better now but not much!”

“One thing you get obsessed about in broadcasting is time,” Elaine, who’s actually the antithesis of rude, continues. “If you’re reading the eight o’clock news, you can’t be turning up at two minutes past!

Thankfully, I’m not quite so reliant on my alarm clock as I was when I was on Ireland AM. That was a 4.30am start, which no matter how long you do it for still feels like the middle of the night. There were mornings I came to in the make-up chair and thought, ‘How did I get here?’ I’d slept-driven into work. How Mark Cagney’s been doing it since 1999 I really don’t know!”

Elaine getting to spend more quality time with her duvet is down to her moving TV3 studios in 2010 to Midday, the weekday all-female talk show she presents, researches, produces and presumably bottle washes.

“Five hours is a scary amount of live TV to fill every week, but I love it,” the Mallow native enthuses.

“A show like ours is only as good as the guests and we’ve got some wonderful ladies like Amanda Brunker and Mary Coughlan who are smart, funny and not afraid to speak their mind. There are times you forget you’re on the telly, like when I told the nation that we used to dress our now strapping 6’ 7” brother like a little girl and parade him to the neighbours. He wasn’t happy!”

At this point Les Frères Jacques Maitre D’ Sylvain Vallier arrives at our table with a magnificent platter laden with tonight’s fish and seafood options, which

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GOEAT

Wave reviews: Surf ‘n’ Turf’s Martin Shanahan (left) & Paul Flynn

Say “ciao” to Jamie's Italian

A selection of the fine French fare at Les Frères Jacques and (below) their epic seafood platter

At this point a ten-minute break is required to savour our starters – Elaine’s scallops are sweet, juicy and perfectly offset by the gentle heat of the mash while my chicken is again nibbly good, with the honey and sesame to the fore.

“I don’t tend to go to French restaurants, but this is superb,” she enthuses in between sips of a very cheeky white. “Since visiting Beirut, I’ve been a huge Lebanese fan. The spices and juxtaposition of flavours is wonderful in all Arab food. When I was in Dubai, I kept having the cheese and spinach in flatbread, which is almost their McDonald’s. Restaurantwise, there’s a place in Middleton called Farmgate, which does beautiful, flavoursome Irish food; Delhi Palace on Washington St. in Cork is the best Indian in Ireland and for Asian you can’t beat Saba on Dublin’s Clarendon St.” We’re having a conversation about Phad Thai’s we’ve known when our mains turn up. Elaine’s grilled black sole meunière has her in almost When Harry Met Sally paroxysms of delight – “I’ll try and maintain my dignity!” she laughs – while my duck confit is wonderfully crisp on the outside and pink, as requested, beneath the skin.

We don’t need them, but can’t resist the saffron-scented crème brûlée and Normande apple tart with crème fraiche, flambéed au calvados – two French classics that are perfectly executed and lead to much scraping of spoons on plate.

“I’ll definitely be back,” Elaine promises as we say our au revoirs at the end of the night. Moi aussi!

Les Frères Jacques, 74 Dame St., Dublin 2. Tel. (01) 679 4555. lesfreresjacques.com. Monday to Friday 12.30pm – 2pm & 7pm – 10.30pm. Saturday 7.15pm – 11pm. Early Bird weekdays from 6pm – 7pm, with all wine half-price on Monday and Tuesday.

Kinnegar Brewing range

IN LIKE FLYNN

STUART CLARK brings you the latest foodie news

SURF ‘N’ TURF Two Irish food legends for the price of one is the deal every Wednesday on Surf ‘N’ Turf, the new RTÉ One series that finds Martin Shanahan from Kinsale’s Fishy Fishy and Paul Flynn who wears the chef’s hat at The Tannery in Dungarvan journeying to a different Irish seaside town each week.

Once in situ, they have 24 hours to create a meal from locally sourced ingredients.

The accompanying Surf ‘N’ Turf cookbook (Quadrille. Ð19.99, hardback) is a thing of beauty, with the black pudding with chickpeas, garlic & parsley and roast cod, savoy cabbage & crispy gubbeen bacon – that covers most of the food groups – our current faves.

HOPPY TALK The reviews were all rave last Christmas when the Dungarvan Brewing Company released its Chocolate Oatmeal Stout, a supertasty brew that ended up in almost as many beef and venison stews as it did pint glasses.

Their latest seasonal tipple is Comeragh Challenger Bitter, a 3.8% ABV English-style pale ale, which is available both in bottles and on draught, and beats our cross-channel friends at their own game. See www. dungarvanbrewingcompany.com.

It’s also, “Hello and can we have another please!” to 5.1% ABV Angel Stout, the first tipple to be produced by Cork’s Elbow Lane microbrewery. Designed to be drunk with robust dishes like curry it’s soon to be joined by Wisdom Ale and Elbow Lager. See www. elbowlane.ie for a list of stockists.

Also whetting the Go Rail whistle this summer are the fine range of

54

libations produced by the “more nano than micro” Kinnegar Brewing in Rathmullan, Co. Donegal. Their 4.9% ABV Limeburner Northern Pale Ale, 5.3% Scraggy Bay India Pale Ale and Devil’s Backbone Northern Amber Ale, another 4.9%er, are all quality quaffs. www. kinnegarbrewing.com tells you where to find them.

MAKE MINE A BUBBLE Milkshakes? Schmilkshakes! The hottest summer cooler in town is Bubble Tea, a Taiwanese blend of tea, milk and chewy tapioca pearls which looks a bit like frogspawn, but tastes divine. The first Bubblicity shop has just opened in Dublin 2’s Georges St. Arcade and is rarely to be found without a member of the Go Rail crew gracing its counters. www.facebook.com/bubblicity

OLIVER’S TWIST Jamie Oliver has been an increasingly frequent visitor to Dublin in recent times and now we know why – the 36-year-old has chosen Dundrum Town Centre as the location for Jamie’s Italian, the newest in a chain of 29 eateries, which serves a full range of Mediterranean favourites given the unique Mr. Oliver twist.

“Opening in Dublin is a dream come true for me because it’s a city I’ve loved for many years,” he enthuses. “Anyone who has been to a Jamie’s Italian in the UK knows that we’re all about delicious, affordable food and great staff, so we’re currently on the hunt for around 75 fantastic local people to join our team as chefs and front of house staff.”

Contact recruitment@jamiesitalian .ie if that sounds like you.

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AVA I L A B L E I N A L L G O O D N E W S A G E N T S !

24/07/2012 13:46:49

GOFASHION

K

I

PA RIS AN

CH C

From swimsuits to chic tailoring and sassy summer night looks, ROE McDERMOTT has all the low-down on all the latest trends this season.

T

his season is all about chic summer simplicity, and about keeping shapes clean and light – and no-one does sophisticated summer sensuality like Parisian women, so look to them for your inspiration. Shop around for tailored jackets, cute formal shorts and shift dresses for a look that’s classy and crisp – but, true to the season, keep those hemlines short and sassy to show off that sex appeal and the all-important tan! (Don’t worry if you got it out of a bottle – with the weather this summer, we don’t blame you and won’t name and shame you.) To keep things interesting, look for contrasting material or patterns, like mixing dressy sequined skirts or shorts with light cotton tops, or wear a silky, shimmery number with some cut-off denims. If in doubt, cute stripes are always a good way to instantly give your outfit that certain je ne sais quoi – but maybe leave the stereotypical beret (sans baguette!) at home til the autumn!

OH, THOSE SUMMER NIGHTS Danny and Sandy got it right – no, not the skintight leather and over-permed hair, that’s next season’s look. No, we mean about summer nights. Something about the balmy weather, gently lapping waves, palm trees and cute cocktail umbrellas makes us come over all sensual...And yes, we may only be watching this mystical summer on ads for travel agents as we go make ourselves a hot water bottle in July, but we’re still going to shop for it. This summer, it’s all about taking your outfits from day-tonight, and a really easy garment to dress up is

the ever-flattering maxi dress. Simply swap the gladiator sandals or flip-flops for some sky-high metallic heels, add some statement jewellery and a cute bag, and you’re all ready to dance the night away in beach babe style.

GOING FOR A SUMMER PROMENADE One trend we never get sick of is 1950s Mad Men-inspired clothes, and we’re happy to say that this fad is in it for the long haul. With its full skirts, nipped in waists and corseted tops, there’s no trend that oozes mature femininity quite like it, and flatters all different shapes. In fact, it looks even sexier on girls with curves, which comes as a serious relief to us because we’ve been pigging out on ice-cream morning, noon and night since May... But good shapes are all down to good tailoring and good design, which is why we’re thrilled that Debenhams is stocking the new collection by Jasper Conran. Beautifully designed and made, these prom dresses and skirts are great for summer days spent picnicking and promenading or summer nights spent dancing. Remember the all-important Alice band or sweet hat and you’ll be turning an old-fashioned trend into something seriously fashion forward.

SWIMMING IN STYLE Yes, it’s the dreaded swimsuit season – but fear not, we’re not one of those magazines that will start lecturing you on how to shift a couple of pounds before hitting the beach. We think you’re perfect just the way you are. We’re also too lazy to do any of those exercises ourselves

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– and are definitely not giving up our summer diet of milkshakes and beachside fish and chips – so we’d be hypocrites if we expected anything more from you! But really, there’s no need to fear swimgear as long as you go for the right shape.

Bandeau tops and string bottoms are best suited to the slim figure, while longer, 1950s-style tops can be incredibly flattering on curves. If you’re self-conscious about your bum or chest, wear darker plainer pieces on these problem areas and clash with ruffled or patterned pieces to draw attention to your best assets. Remember to seek out pretty sarongs and cute sandals for inbetween swims, and don’t forget your sun-lotion – not even we can make anything look good on lobster-red skin!

CON IS FOR CONFIDENCE! Finally, if you want to make a splash on nights out on the town as well as days down by the beach, this super sexy look is the way to go.

Body con dresses come into style regularly – and it’s easy to see why. This ultra-clingy, feminine look is designed to hug you in all the right places so that your best assets are clearly highlighted.

But beware, the structured look is a strong one, so be prepared to wear with an attitude! Look for flattering neck lines in gorgeous metallic colours, and make sure your pins are prepped, because hemlines are worn sky-high! To keep your ensembles from looking more trashy than sassy, keep accessories to a minimum, like one statement ring, and let the dress do the talking.

And of course, make sure you’ve got a killer pair of heels to keep your strut in stride!

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K 06.

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01. Black dress with embxxxxx

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DEBENHAMS Henry Street, Dublin 1 Blanchardstown Shopping Centre, Dublin 15 Mahon Point Shopping Centre, Co.Cork 4 Eyre Street, The Docks, Co.Galway

MONSOON 64 Grafton Street, Dublin 2 10/12 Williamsgate Street, Co.Galway Unit 30 Mahon Point Shopping Centre, Co. Cork 29 Cruises Street, Co. Limerick

(Main Picture) Blue pattern maxi dress, ¤25 Awear 01. Black & white dress by J for Jasper Conran, ¤128 Debenhams 02. Metallic bodycon dress, ¤40 Awear 03. Belted shorts, ¤35 Awear 04. Embellished scallop hem skirt, ¤60 Awear 05. Nude bodycon dress, ¤45 Awear 06. Floral pattern maxi dress, ¤25 Awear 07. Ruffled flower bikini ¤18.50, Monsoon 08. Anjuna Bikini, ¤34 Monsoon 09. Madeleine bow jumper, ¤59 Monsoon 10. Gold dress by J for Jasper Conran, ¤135.50 Debenhams

STOCKISTS AWEAR 26 Grafton Street, Dublin 2 Henry Street, Dublin 1 Edward Square, Barrack Lane, Co. Galway 110 St. Patrick Street, Co. Cork 69 -71 William Street, Co. Limerick

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GOHEALTH

SPONSORED BY

CLONMEDICA

YOUR BABY'S SKIN

HOW TO LOOK AFTER IT

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SPONSORED BY

CLONMEDICA

Whoever coined the expression ‘skin like a baby’ probably never had one.

A baby’s skin is sensitive and is prone to a number of ailments. These are completely normal, but of course, they often come as a shock to new parents.

Here, MARIE RYAN takes you through the most common problems and offers advice on how to deal with them.

BABY ACNE Babies, like teenagers, can suffer from acne – about one in five babies get spots. These can look like pimples, or little white spots, known as milia. Infant acne is most likely to occur on the face although outbreaks can also happen on the back. If it appears elsewhere it is possible this is cradle cap or eczema.

The good news is that baby acne is not serious, nor is it likely to bother your child. Baby acne is caused by immature sweat glands, and it is possible that the hormones a baby receives during the end of pregnancy may play a role. Detergent, rough fabrics, spilt milk, oily moisturisers and hot weather can aggravate it.

Baby acne normally clears up by itself. If the problem lasts longer, you can speak to your doctor about a mild topical cream. You should never use an over-the-counter remedy for acne on a baby’s skin.

Try switching to non-oily skincare products. Of course, acne doesn’t look great for your baby photos but that’s really the worst of it!

PEELING SKIN During the first few weeks, your baby’s skin may peel.

Like baby acne this is normal. The palms and soles are especially prone to peeling. You should use a baby moisturiser to help keep the skin soft, but the peeling should clear up by itself.

CRADLE CAP Cradle cap or seborrheic dermatitis is a skin condition causing flakes and scaly skin on a baby’s head or eyebrows. Many babies suffer from this, particularly in the first year of their life. Use baby oil to soften the crusty skin, wait a few minutes and gently brush the flakes away. Always use a mild baby shampoo when washing your baby’s hair. Adult shampoos are too harsh and may aggravate cradle cap.

NAPPY RASH Almost every baby gets nappy rash at some point and the red, sore skin can be a trial to our little darlings.

When your baby wets his/her nappy, bacteria reacts with the urine and forms ammonia. If you don’t change the nappy soon enough, the ammonia can burn their skin. Check your baby’s nappy often and change it as soon as she soils herself. Clean her with mild baby soap and damp cotton wool and pat the skin dry.

To treat nappy rash, you should apply an ointment and follow this with special medicated baby powder.

Ointments and powders such as Caldease treat nappy rash and soothe the skin.

To make sure you don’t aggravate nappy rash, wash nappies in a non-biological powder and rinse thoroughly. If it is not cold, letting your baby go without a nappy or plastic pants is a good idea. This will give the skin time to breathe.

ECZEMA If you or your partner suffers from eczema, your baby may get it too. Use very gentle baby soap and mild, non-biological detergents to prevent irritating the skin. After washing, apply a moderate amount of moisturiser.

RASHES Newborn babies are prone to regular rashes as well as nappy rash. Most of these are harmless and clear up by themselves. For example, prickly heat rash: small pinkish-red bumps which appear on areas that are prone to sweating. Try and keep your baby in a cool, dry place and use loose fitting clothing, and it should clear up.

SUNBURN A baby’s skin is very sensitive and prone to sunburn.

Prevention is better than cure, so be sure to keep your baby in the shade when he is outside. Long sleeves and a hat are a good idea and you can use small amounts of sunscreen made with zinc oxide or titanium dioxide.

If your baby is under a year old and gets sunburnt, take him to the doctor. Sunburn, even a mild one, can be serious in young babies. Speak to the doctor about which ointments are suitable. Don’t use anything overthe-counter and made for older skins.

Try a cool bath to help alleviate the pain. Add baking soda to make it more soothing. Pat the skin dry very gently and apply a water-based baby moisturiser. Be careful not to pop the blisters by accident. Try and keep him as comfortable as possible in loose clothing that won’t irritate the skin.

DRY SKIN Just like an adult’s, a baby’s skin can get dry. This is particularly a problem in winter, as the combination of cold outside air and indoor heating can deplete the skin’s moisture.

To treat dry skin, don’t let your baby spend too much time in the bath. Ten minutes is plenty of time.

Use soap sparingly or try a fragrance-free, soap-free cleanser. Many babies love to play in the bath. Let yours have playtime in the water before you wash him. That way he isn’t sitting in soapy water. Don’t use bubble bath, or at least not often.

Apply moisturiser as soon as you have dried him.

This will help seal in moisture. You may need to use a thicker cream or ointment or moisturise twice a day to help heal dry skin.

Protecting your baby’s skin from the weather will help prevent dry skin. Make sure he is well wrapped up if it is cold, and shaded from the sun in the summer. If dry skin persists, you may need to consider using a humidifier in your baby’s room.

Baby’s skincare can seem like a daunting task, but mostly it is common sense. Always use products made for babies, and in as gentle a formulation as you can find if your baby has very sensitive skin. Be careful with detergents. A mild, non-biological detergent is less likely to cause irritated skin. Always make sure nappies and clothing are well rinsed. Natural fibres and loose-fitting clothing help keep your baby comfortable.

It’s natural to worry if your baby has a skin complaint, but most are not serious and clear up by themselves. If you are concerned or if a skin condition is persistent or seems more serious than those described here, visit your doctor. With newborns and young babies, better safe than sorry is the rule.

Knowing you need not worry helps mums sleep better at night – and we need all the sleep we can get!

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GO

REVIEW A L B U M S .

THE AVENGERS

M O V I E S .

B O O K S

PG64

GOLISTEN.

GOWATCH.

WE SAMPLE A SELECTION OF THE SUMMERTIME'S MOST EAGERLY-AWAITED MUSICAL TREASURES, INCLUDING NEW RELEASES FROM OSCARWINNER GLEN HANSARD, CELTIC SOUL BROTHERS DEXYS MIDNIGHT RUNNERS AND ZILLIONSELLING POP PRINCESS CHERYL COLE.

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE INDIFFERENT AMONG THIS SUMMER'S DVD RELEASES COME UNDER THE GO RAIL MICROSCOPE. THIS MUST BE THE PLACE, DAMSELS IN DISTRESS, AVENGERS ASSEMBLE, WE BOUGHT A ZOO AND MANY OTHER MOVIES ARE EXAMINED AND EVALUATED.

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GOREAD. THERE'S NO FINER WAY TO SPEND YOUR JOURNEY THAN LUXURIATING IN A GOOD BOOK; THOUGHTPROVOKING NEW TOMES

BY JOHN IRVING, KATE SUMMERSCALE AND JOHN BANVILLE'S ALTEREGO BENJAMIN BLACK ARE ALL WORTH A LOOK THIS SUMMERTIME.

GOLISTEN. IN THE COMPANY OF GLEN

COLM O’HARE IS YOUR GUIDE TO SOME OF THE SUMMER’S TOP MUSIC RELEASES, INCLUDING GLEN HANSARD, CHERYL COLE AND MORE

S

ummer – or what passes for summer in this green and soggy land – should mean seasonally-appropriate listening. Those lazy, hazy days are best enjoyed with a melodic and suitably sunny soundtrack. The last truly decent summer, back in 2003, was accompanied by the jangling melodies and (USA) West Coast harmonies of Dublin outfit The Thrills and their debut album, So Much For The City. More recently The Duckworth Lewis Method’s cricket-inspired concept album made for perfect summer listening. (It even boasted a track entitled ‘Rain Stopped Play’, covering all meteorological bases!)

Though he surely must have appreciated any dry weather he could find back in his busking days, Glen Hansard is more a man for all seasons, musically speaking. He’s certainly spread his talents far and wide over the years, including spending two decades with The Frames, not to mention his successful Swell Season collaboration with Marketa Irglova, his Oscar-winning adventures with the Once movie soundtrack and, this year, his Broadway triumphs with the stage version of the movie. For his legions of fans, Hansard can do no wrong, in whatever musical guise he chooses.

But to some, he has often promised more than he has delivered. Until now, that is. For his solo debut album is arguably his best collection of songs to date, combining as it does the wisdom of his years and influences that range from Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Leonard Cohen to Wilco and Ryan Adams. Rhythm & Repose begins on a fairly sombre note with the pared-down ‘You Will Become’, featuring just a plucked acoustic guitar, some elegant strings and his voice. The countrytinged ballad ‘Maybe Not Tonight’ has a full band line-up and comes across almost like an update of

Jimmy Webb’s ‘By The Time I Get To Phoenix’ as famously performed by another Glen (Campbell!).

More ambient textures backdrop the almost triphoppy ‘Talking With The Wolves’, while there is a clear Ryan Adams influence on ‘High Hope’. Other highlights include the poignant, piano-grounded ‘Bird Of Sorrow’ and the soulful ‘Love Don’t Leave Me Waiting’, which could’ve been on any Van Morrison album between 1970 and 1990, while the album ends the way it began with the low-key intensity of ‘Song Of Good Hope’.

Dexys Midnight Runners in their original incarnation were unique in every sense. Starting out as Northern soul brothers, eulogising cult soul singer Geno Washington before morphing into a Celtic jamboree to create their biggest hit ‘Come On Eileen’, they burned brightly but briefly in the early ‘80s. Twenty-seven years since their last album and following a long sabbatical spent battling various demons and a couple of failed solo efforts, Kevin Rowland is back with a new version of the band and a terrific album in One Day I’m Going To Soar.

While there are strong echoes of the old days here, the youthful euphoria has been replaced by a more introspective maturity that finds Rowland in fine voice on melancholy fare such as ‘Lost’ and ‘Me’ (which sounds a bit like The Style Council - not surprising, given that Paul Weller’s old sidekick, Mick Talbot, is onboard). Though there is a tad more vulnerability in his voice these days, Rowland is passionate and intense on ‘I’m Always Going To Love You’, where he spars with guest vocalist Madeleine Hyland, but he’s at his very best when channelling his love for classic soul on tracks like ‘Nowhere Is Home’ and ‘Incapable of Love’.

Which brings us to Cheryl Cole, whose image

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and speaking voice are arguably more familiar to the masses than her singing is - thanks to the 16 million viewers of The X-Factor, the nonstop tabloid exposure and those L’Oreal ads.

Despite her massive captive audience, the third solo album from the former Girls Aloud singer, A Million Lights, is a fairly predictable and largely unconvincing affair, containing as it does all of the processed beats, rhythms and textures of the typical radio-pop-dance-club sound of 2012. That said, the Calvin Harris-produced single ‘Call My Name’ is undeniably catchy and danceable, while the big ballad title track allows a little more of her personality to shine through. Elsewhere she struts her sassy, brassy stuff on some of the more hiphop oriented tracks like ‘Ghetto Baby’ and ‘Sexy Den A Mutha’, but overall this is a holding pattern of an album rather than an artistic triumph.

GOWATCH. SEE HERE NOW

ROE MCDERMOTT IS YOUR GUIDE TO SOME OF THE HOTTEST NEW DVD RELEASES

O

ne for the whole family, Cameron Crowe’s We Bought A Zoo is based on the true story of The Guardian’s former DIY columnist Benjamin Mee, who relocated to a private zoo. Matt Damon plays the widowed journalist who trades in normal life for a world where Scarlett Johannsson is a zookeeper and there’s lots of lions and tigers and bears. Damon is endearing as always, Crowe’s light-saturated shots of the lush Californian wildlife park are stunning, while the kids couldn’t be cuter. As a zoo aid, Elle Fanning is a big blonde mess of toothy-grinned heartwarm, while Benjamin’s daughter Maggie Elizabeth Jones is like the twin sister of Jerry Maguire’s Jonathan Lipnicki – wide-eyed and wise beyond her years, she’s always one heart-melting smile away from telling you that a tiger cub weighs three pounds. But apart from Jónsi’s stunning and emotive score, there’s no energy to proceedings, no spark. Like Johannsson’s depressed tiger, We Bought A Zoo never roars into real action or emotion; it merely chuffs along, content to distract all and affect few. Damon’s personal tragedy, his budding romance with Johannsson, son Dylan’s internal struggles, and even the animals are all examined from a safe distance. Though a nice, inoffensive and sweet film, it’s Cameron Crowe Yoghurt: low fat and vanilla-flavoured to go down easy.

One for the adults and those who like their comedies quirky and off the beaten track, This Must Be The Place sees Sean Penn play an aging Robert Smith-like rock star who travels from Dublin to America to hunt down his father’s Nazi tormenter. Even with that pitch, there’s so much wrong with Paolo Sorrentino’s latest effort, both tonally and thematically, that it comes as no surprise that many things about the picture do not work. What is a huge surprise however, is that even more things do, and beautifully.

As one-time ‘80s glam rocker Cheyenne, Penn is a delight. With mannerisms more often like a downer Ozzie Osbourne than Cure icon Smith, everything from his halting speech, childish wideeyed gaze, unbearably slow movements and the most delayed yet infectious high-pitched giggle ever uttered, ooze a warmth and innocence that’s impossible not to surrender to.

But there’s something devastatingly lonely about the depressive Cheyenne too, who spends his time pottering around a landmarkpocked Dublin. So when his father dies, Cheyenne’s decision to travel to America to hunt out his Nazi camp warden is both absurd and understandable; an extreme and unlikely undertaking by a man in desperate search for

meaning. With a gorgeous score from David Byrne, a script littered with delicious oddities and a strikingly sentimental turn from Penn, this is the place for anyone ready to go on a one-of-a kind, hilarious, heartbreaking and utterly unique road-trip.

In another strange little indie comedy, Damsels In Distress, crouching yuppie, hidden WASP director Whit Stillman specialises in sharplywritten observations about the urban haute bourgeoisie as they experience stylised, Jane Austen-like comedies of manners. But while Stillman’s flair for sharp dialogue and wonderful whimsy has survived his 13-year long hiatus from filmmaking, he seems to have sacrificed his trademark dark humour for a more pastel palette. Though for pretty pastel protagonists, petals don’t come more precious than Greta Gerwig. Playing Violet, the queen-bee of a ditsy and didactic collegiate bouquet made up of wary newcomer Lily (Crazy, Stupid, Love’s Analeigh Tipton), ‘British’ Rose and naïve Heather, Gerwig is a wonderfully wide-eyed combination of affectations and eccentricities.

As the young ladies navigate college life, Stillman piles on deadpan sarcasm and some superb one-liners, bringing into focus the girls’ youthful narcissism and delusion. But for every zinging one-liner there are endless infuriatingly undeveloped plot points and unrealised hints at satire. Groupthink, fads and religious cults are all touched on, but never explored in detail. Even the date of the film’s setting remains vague, further adding to the confusion: who is Stillman talking to, and about whom? For a film called Damsels In Distress, this comedy is light and quirky but plays it far too safe.

Finally, in September we get to see the comic book movie of the decade come to DVD – and trust us, you’d better believe the hype. Brilliantly collecting all the loose threads from the lead-up films of the past five years, Avengers Assemble sees the Avengers join up with military law enforcement agency S.H.I.E.L.D to stop Thor’s (Chris Hemsworth) brother Loki (Tom Hiddleston) from destroying the planet.

As superhero films go, it’s got everything. Each character is given their chance to shine, and though Robert Downey Jr. shoots out his usual stream of great one-liners, Thor’s bombastic, faux-Elizabethan delusions of grandeur and Hulk’s Neanderthal mentality are also uproariously funny.

But underneath the humour, real care and attention is given to the complex relationship between these characters. Though Clark Gregg’s

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fan-boy bureaucrat Phil Coulson tries to unite the Avengers (becoming the heart and soul of the film in the process), there are egotistical sparring matches, comparisons of power and deep levels of distrust – mainly levered against Ruffalo’s Bruce Banner, whose transformations into the unstoppable rage monster Hulk are viewed as one of the team’s biggest threats. Ruffalo is mesmerising in the role, bringing a vulnerability to a man driven to desperation because of his lack of control over both his body and mind.

With humour, committed actors, real emotional weight, brilliantly choreographed fights and an epic grand finale, there’s only one thing to say: Avengers SMASH. Also worth a look is the hedonistic teen party experience Project X (not for the faint of heart, nervous of disposition or old of age!), the gorgeous coming-of-age French film The Kid With A Bike and Mel Gibson’s darkly funny action flick How I Spent My Summer Vacation.

But do be sure to avoid the awful, cliché-ridden “rom-com” This Means War, boring horror flick Silent House and the over-budgeted snoozefest sci-fi John Carter, which proves about as interesting as its title – you’d be better off staying out and braving the weather.

GOREAD. SIZZLING SUMMER READS

ANNE SEXTON ASSESSES SOME NEW RELEASES FROM MASTERS OF THE WRITTEN WORD.

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hen a writer has built a reputation off a critically and commercially successful book, it can be difficult to live in its shadow – everything you do will be compared to your masterpiece. This month we’re looking at the new releases from three well regarded authors – John Irving, Kate Summerscale and John Banville’s alter ego, Benjamin Black – and sizing them up.

John Irving’s best-loved novel is The World According To Garp, although many people would argue that A Prayer For Owen Meany is a more fully realised work. Irving’s latest novel, In One Person, covers much of the same discursive ground as his previous work – writers, wrestling and sexuality are all themes. While his earlier books may deal with sexual diversity, In One Person is a polemic for tolerance. At the centre of the novel is Billy Abbott, a bisexual writer, and In One Person is written almost as his autobiography, allowing Irving to trace changing attitudes to sexuality from the ‘50s to the present day.

If there is a flaw, it is that the social history is not convincing. Billy’s unorthodox sexuality doesn’t cause the violent reprisals or homophobic bullying common in our era. When it becomes known that he has had a sexual relationship with a male-to-female transgender former wrestler,

his school friends, teachers and peer group treat him with either sympathy or respect. In a similar way, his grandfather’s penchant for dressing up in women’s clothes and acting female roles in theatre productions is for the most part regarded as nothing more than an eccentricity.

Despite this, In One Person is a very enjoyable novel, and given the current state of American discourse around sexuality, a timely plea for acceptance. It may not be a masterpiece, but even a good Irving book is better than many writers at their best.

Kate Summerscale’s historical crime book The Suspicions Of Mr. Whicher was the surprise bestseller of 2008. For her new book, Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace, Summerscale again unearths a forgotten scandal, but of a very different kind.

In 1850 Isabella Robinson met Edward Lane.

Isabella was unhappily married and developed strong feelings for Lane, a charming young doctor ten years her junior with a wife and family. She confessed her feelings, and their subsequent romance, in her diary. When this was discovered by her husband and used as the basis for a divorce, Isabella and Lane became the Victorian equivalent of a tabloid scandal.

Mrs. Robinson’s Disgrace is a fascinating story

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in itself but also a well-researched work of social history. Summerscale examines the history of divorce, the position of married women and exposes the double standards of Victorian morality. Like her previous book, it’s an erudite page-turner and something of a triumph.

As one of Ireland’s most respected novelists and a former Booker Prize winner, it seems fair to hold John Banville to a high standard. Unfortunately his Benjamin Black crime novels promise more than they deliver. His hard-drinking pathologist Quirk is back in Vengeance, a story of family and business rivalry gone fatally awry. Out on his boat, Victor Delahaye draws a gun and commits suicide.

The only witness to this is Davy Clancy, the son of Delahaye’s business partner, Jack. It looks like a mysterious suicide but when Jack Clancy is murdered, Quirk and his sidekick, Inspector Hackett, realise there is something rotten between the two families.

Vengeance is by no means a bad novel, but it is a flawed one. The set-up is intriguing, but the resolution is a disappointment. Dublin is drawn with skill and elegance, but the characters are not.

If you enjoyed the previous Benjamin Black books, this may be for you. If not, try another of Ireland’s talented crime writers – we’ve got plenty of them.

G O F I G U R E

GO RAILS BRAIN TEASERS

QUIZ (A)

(B)

(C)

FOUR U.S. STATES BEGIN WITH THE LETTER A:

THE THREE LONGEST RIVERS IN IRELAND ARE:

Alabama Arizona Alaska

Shannon Barrow Suir

ALFRED HITCHCOCK HAS RECEIVED FIVE OSCAR NOMINATIONS, FOR:

Can you name the fourth?

Can you name the fourth?

Rebecca Lifeboat Psycho Spellbound Can you name the fifth?

IARNRÓD ÉIREANN ARE OFFERING 5 LUCKY QUIZ WINNERS 5 PAIRS OF INTERCITY TICKETS! PLEASE EMAIL YOUR ANSWERS TO GORAIL@HOTPRESS.IE

CROSSWORD ACROSS

1 8 9 10 11 12 14 15 16 20 21 23 24 25

DOWN

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 13 15 17 18 19 22

Makers (13) Shellfish (4) Assured (10) Actor Gene (6) Oceanic record label (8) Dean Koontz novel (9) The - Are 17d (The Who) (4) Military lights out (4) Isoscoles or Equilateral (9) Valuable Depeche Mode hit (8) Fast-moving waters (6) Gratifying to mix fit sayings (10) Parent’s sister (4) Groups of people who work together (13)

A thousand thousand (7) Called amend turned (5) Some were compulsary in skating (7) Attributes (15) Miss Otis regrets, she’s - to lunch today (6) Prolonging a gallop? (9) Taxonomic group (7) Pregnant (9) Twister (7) Arthur Daley (7) Conclusions (7) Casket (6) Ebony and ivory (5)

CROSSWORD SOLUTION DOWN: 1 Million, 2 Named, 3 Figures, 4 Characteristics, 5 Unable, 6 Extending, 7 Species, 13 Expecting, 15 Tornado, 17 Alright, 18 Endings, 19 Coffin, 22 Piano.

ACROSS: 1 Manufacturers, 8 Clam, 9 Guaranteed, 10 Wilder, 11 Atlantic, 12 Intensity, 14 Kids, 15 Taps, 16 Triangles, 20 Precious, 21 Rapids, 23 Satisfying, 24 Aunt, 25 Organisations.

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