Glorious Exploits

One of the most original and brilliant Irish debuts in years * Irish Times *‘The debut novelist to watch … Remarkable … This debut is entertaining, vivid, original – and has a huge amount of fun turning the genre on its head … The premise is irresistible … Terrific … A novel to be gulped down’ * The i *Bold and totally unexpected, I loved this book. A brilliant novel about friendship, the healing power of art, and why we must fight for our dreams. I was hooked from the first page * Douglas Stuart, author of Shuggie Bain *Immensely likeable … Raucously funny … The writing is beautifully controlled * The Observer *Brilliant … I love contemporary Irish fiction and Greek tragedy, so how wonderful to find a novel where they are brilliantly paired. It is as hilarious, moving, and profound as promised * Rebecca F. Kuang, author of Yellowface *As thrilling for me as the first time I picked up a Kevin Barry novel. Glorious Exploits is exuberant, funny, lyrical and profoundly moving. It is, quite simply, a rare beauty * Sarah Winman, author of Still Life *Glorious Exploits stinks of misery, despair, love, war, poetry, reckless ambition, terrible failure, and glorious triumph. It’s a novel thick with the stuff of the Classics, in other words. A delicious treat of a read. I loved it * Jon McGregor *In At Swims-Two-Birds, Flann O’Brien gave us cowboys riding through Dublin. Now, Ferdia Lennon gives us modern-day Dubliners living among the ancient Greeks. This is a very special, very clever, very entertaining novel * Roddy Doyle *One of the best debut novels of the year – it even received an award saying so – this is a ridiculously fun book…It’s a poignant story about war, art, and friendship, while also being very funny * iPaper – The 30 best books for Christmas 2024 *Funny, thoughtful, moving, brilliant * Nick Laird, Irish Sunday Independent *

FERDIA LENNON was born and raised in Dublin. He holds a BA in History and Classics from University College Dublin and an MA in Prose Fiction from the University of East Anglia. Glorious Exploits is his first novel. A Sunday Times bestseller, it was adapted for BBC Radio 4 and was the winner of the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize 2024. After spending many years in Paris, he now lives in Norwich with his wife and son.