SPRING MUST-READS

Here we look at some of the latest releases which are sure to make it onto your spring must-read list.

MAXOL: CELEBRATING

100 YEARS Benji is a beautiful little Robin Red Breast with one big problem. His little red breast sometimes turns a bright shade of blue! Benji must go on a journey to discover why his chest changes colour and how to stop it! Maxol 1920–2020: Celebrating the First Hundred Can Benji ever be a true Robin Red Breast? Years of an Irish Family Company written by bestselling author Turtle Bunbury is the story of Maxol, the Rachel McCoy is a primary school teacher from Northern Ireland who family-owned Irish company that is owned today by gained a First Class Honours in English Literature alongside her BEd. Teaching is her vocation but she has always loved the same family who founded it back in 1920.to write creatively and has combined her teaching experience with her writing to bring her first

As Turtle Bunbury writes in the book:children's story to life. Rachel is married with two daughters who love to listen to stories from their mummy. Rachel

“Maxol’s evolution over the last hundred years is a has used her personal experience in combination with her teaching experience to explore emotions lived and felt by story abounding in brilliance, ingenuity, serendipity children in their formative years. and triumph. There have also been battles, both personal and corporate, in which true grit, hard work and honest ambition did much to overcome situations of tremendous adversity.”

The book charts the formative decades of the company including its division into two separate companies in the 1930s; enduring the Second World War; the birth of the Maxol brand in the 1960s; their navigation of the 1970s global oil crisis; and the transformative integration of the two companies in the mid – 1990s.

The story is brought bang up to date with the company’s evolution into a global leader in terms of food innovation and convenience and with a move into the green energy sector, with the launch of bright energy in July 2020, as it transitions from fossil fuels to renewables.

THE STORY OF AN IRISH FAMILY BUSINESS | 1920–2020

CELEBRAT ING 100 YEARS

The story of an Irish family business | 1920 –2020

TURTLE BUNBURY

TURTLE BUNBURY

BENJI BLUE

Local primary school teacher, Rachel McCoy recently selfpublished her fi rst children’s story entitled; ‘Benji Blue.’ It tells the tale of a little Robin Red Breast whose chest turns blue when he is feeling sad. The aim of writing the book was to help children gain confi dence in expressing and sharing emotions and to celebrate difference, encouraging children to be proud of who they are.

THE GARDEN

Paul Perry is an award-winning poet and novelist. He has published several collections of poetry, most recently Blindsight. He also co-authored four international bestselling novels as Kareen Perry, including The Innocent Sleep. Paul Perry’s fi rst solo novel tells of smothering power, loyalty and agency thwarted by the tragic patterns of memory and behaviour. The Garden is a modern fable, and a warning against trespassing upon nature in the name of profi t.

The Garden by Paul Perry Publishing May 2021, New Island Books

Mum and daughter Gail and Holly Hadson with Athena.

Stacey Bowman with Ollie and Toby.

BALLYHOLME

The mile long crescent of sandy beach at Ballyholme esplanade in Bangor was recently enjoyed by families paddling and building sand castles during the recent fi ne spring weather. As well as couples and dog walkers enjoying a brisk walk the beach was also popular with more adventurous sea bathers and wet suited kite surfers.

Janet and Chris Calvert.

Norma and Steven Granet. Sandra and Norman Little with Jodie and Chloe.

Kite surfers Blade and dad Kyle Cromie.

Jack and Victoria Wilson. Adrian Quinn and Louise Vance. Bill and Gill Geddis and daughter Vivienne Moore with dogs Molly and Dolly.

TURTLE BUNBURY

Author and historian

1. What do you love most about your job?

Historians are basically detectives in disguise. It’s all about piecing together the evidence. Whether I’m researching the layout of a stone circle, the cause of a war or the evolution of petrol pumps on a Maxol forecourt, I still get a tremendous kick out of discovering the clues scattered through the annals of the past. It’s also wonderfully unpredictable. History is such a vast and multidimensional canvas that I never know what I am going to learn next.

2. What has been your career highlight to date?

I’ve been immensely lucky in my career; highlights keep happening. The launch of each new book has its own charm but it’s hard not to single out ‘The Irish Pub’, a collaboration with the photographer James Fennell. We launched it at the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin and got a sponsor on board so that all our guests had access to a free bar. I dedicated the evening to a teacher who once told me I couldn’t organise a piss up in a brewery.

Writing the cover story for National Geographic Traveler in the same year that I had historical features published in Playboy and The World of Interiors felt like a hat-trick not many are likely to achieve.

I was Writer-in-Residence at the Princess Grace Irish Library in Monaco for a stint, which was fab, and I also love being spoiled rotten when invited to speak in places like New York, Chicago and Savannah, Georgia. explored the landscape around our home in County Carlow. Tracking the fl ow of every stream, clambering to all the highest points, trying to make sense of old ruins and other stone shapes scattered in the fi elds and gathering up any records of such places in the history books.

I spend a huge amount of time with my family, which I adore, but at this stage in the lockdown proceedings I am deeply looking forward to a weekend of rambling hills, historical sites and river swims, followed by an evening of inspirational pints and succulent dinner with pals unseen for far too long.

4. What is your daily routine?

The notion of a routine used to fi ll me with fear but these days I’m a sucker for it … no two days are ever quite the same, but this is the approximate way it works in the week. 7:25: Awaken. 7:45: Reawaken. 9: Coff ee pot burbling in my studio and computer cranks up. (Postpone to 9:15 if doing school run.) Work through until 1:30. 1:30: Lunch (ideally outside, reading a magazine). 2-6/7: Back to offi ce, with a 1-hour walk of the dog in the midst of it all. 6-12: Hang with Ally and the daughters, maybe a hot bath. We’ll all bundle around a telly for a double dose of something like ‘Modern Family’ or ‘Fawlty Towers’ before bed.

5. Do you have a fi tness regime?

Yes. And no. I have fi tness binges. I’ll jog every day for two weeks, or do an online pilates workout every day for a week. And then I’ll let it slide and the weeks since my last jog or pilates session somehow become months. I do go for a hearty walk every day but I know that’s not enough. I used to swim quite frequently in a nearby pool, which was excellent, but the pool has been closed since lockdown began.

6. Do you have any tips for staying positive during this time?

During the bleaker hours of this pandemic, I’ve been a complete ostrich and buried my head in the sands of the past. I wrote a book called ‘The Irish Diaspora’ during lockdown and found it much better to be thinking about 7th century Europe or the American Revolution than listening to the daily tally of infection and death all around me. I’m not sure if that’s living in utter denial but I certainly felt a lot more upbeat by taking a break from the day-to-day challenges of the present and losing myself in another world.

7. What do you think is the best thing about living in Ireland?

I was a travel writer for a decade and visited many gorgeous lands but traveling around Ireland presents landscapes that are as fi ne as any. It’s also a historian’s paradise because we not only have 10,000 years of humanity to puzzle over, but Ireland is also the source of origin for huge numbers of people who made their mark in the US and other lands which, to my mind, helps to give us a strong sense of place. We have humour too. It’s kind of buried a little at the moment but it will be back.

8. What is your mantra or favourite quote that you live by?

In my 20s, it was ‘Living dangerously is half the fun.’ That course of action put me behind scehdule on my ambitions so I nabbed a line from Elvis: ‘A little less conversation, a little more action please.’ I turn 50 next year so that will call for a new mantra.

9. Who has been your biggest infl uence?

I’ve always been quite good at befriending old timers and I greatly value what they have to say. I volunteered to live with my grandfather for a year when I was 30, which gave me a lot of perspective. My history teachers inevitably exerted an infl uence, as did my family. I’m the third son so I undoubtedly had an eye on my big brothers growing up, although actually my younger sister ended up being a tremendous mentor also. Our hippy-ish aunt taught me a lot of wise things like if you haven’t got a good word to say about someone, don’t say it.

10. FAVOURITE

Movie: ‘Midnight Run’ with Robert de Niro and Charles Grodin.

Band/Musician: The Kinks.

Book: Gabriel Garcia Marquez, ‘100 Years of Solitude’, or any Flashman novel.

Restaurant: The Oak Room, Adare Manor.

Holiday Destination: The next one. Drink: The second pint of stout. Meal: Seafood chowder.