Where Are the Kings

A new Donal Ryan novel is always something to anticipate keenly and there is nothing to disappoint in the marvellous coming-of-age tale Where Are the Kings… A marvellous portrait of a bewildered , sad boy trying to understand a bizarre family with so many secrets while also making sense of the person he is becoming at the very moment of his dawning sexuality… A novel that has so much to say about how emotions fester , sibling jealousy, the weightlessness and formlessness of guilt , and the sudden healing power of “a deluge of love”. * Independent *
A novel bursting at the seams with love, humour and compassion. * Saga *
In his story of a family wracked by loss, the prizewinning Irish author’s incisive prose and flashes of humour keep mawkish sentiment in check… this is a book marked by a frank and unusually high compassion for the uniquely trying experience of early adolescence…. It’s this kind of gentle but deep empathy that gives Where Are the Kings its radiance. * Financial Times *
How is this tragic tale so funny? … Where Are the Kings has its tragedies, but they are wrapped in hope and human decency … this is a small book about small lives … written with tenderness and attention * Sunday Times *
Here is a book that will break your heart and stitch it back together again … Wisdom and tenderness lie at its core, a Ryan trademark, but this novel is extremely funny on the subject of teenage boys, and pitch perfect in its depiction of rural Irish life. * Irish Independent *
A timeless tale of family drama in rural Ireland … A gentle novel of ungentle things * Guardian *
Ryan elevates a story about adolescent grief and sexual awakening with prose of vivid, gleaming buoyancy. Every sentence is a treat. * Daily Mail *
All the characters are richly and idiosyncratically drawn … the writing […] recalls James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man … Ryan offers a vivid and engaging account of Jack’s life in the bustling rural household * Spectator *
As is always the case in Ryan’s novels, solidarity is the only true cement… From tragedy springs a moral: ‘Every single particle in the universe exerts a force on every single other particle. Nothing exists in isolation.’ Where Are the Kings is a marvellous study of the mind in crisis. * Literary Review *
Donal Ryan’s wrenching, gorgeous story of an orphaned boy connects the tectonic emotions of adolescence to the stormy tempers of the natural world * Irish Times *

Donal Ryan, from Nenagh, County Tipperary, has published seven number one bestselling novels and a short story collection. He has won several awards for his fiction, including the European Union Prize for Literature, the Guardian First Book Award and six Irish Book Awards, and has been shortlisted for several more, including the Costa Book Award and the Dublin International Literary Award. He has been nominated for the Booker Prize twice. His most recent novel, Heart Be at Peace, won the Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards, the Orwell Prize for Fiction and was shortlisted for Novel of the Year at the Nero Book Awards. His work has been adapted for stage and screen. He teaches Creative Writing at the University of Limerick.

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