Nonfiction Group Booklist

Solas Nua's Nonfiction Book Group meets every other month.

The first Solas Nua Nonfiction Book Group started in spring 2020, with the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic. The group meets on Zoom, where it remains, for now. Nonfiction subjects range from history, current events, nature and everything in-between. Activities go beyond monthly discussions of a book, the group regularly collaborates with the Solas Nua team, giving valuable input into programming ideas.

There is no membership, anyone is free to join!

Find out about Solas Nua's Fiction Book Group, Poetry Book Group, and Classics Book Group.

Click on this link to join the Zoom session

2024

  • January 22 - Robert Harris, Returning Light (2021)
  • March 25 - Kerri Ni Dochartaigh, Cacophony of Bone (2023)
  • May 27 - Rory Carroll, There Will Be Fire: Margaret Thatcher, the IRA, and Two Minutes That Changed History (2023)
  • July 22 - Leanne McCormick and Elaine Farrell, Bad Bridget: Crime, Mayhem and the Lives of Emigrant Women
  • September 23 - Feargal Cochrane, Belfast: The Story of a City and its People
  • November 25 - Martin Doyle, Dirty Linen: The Troubles in My Home Place (2024)
  • January 27 - Niall Williams and Christine Breen, In Kiltumpter: A year in an Irish Garden (2021)

Previous Nonfiction Group Index

2023

  • January 23 - Julieann Campbell, On Bloody Sunday: A New History Of The Day And Its Aftermath – By The People Who Were There
  • March 27 - Catherine Dunne, An Unconsidered People: The Irish in London - Updated Edition (2021)
  • May 22 - Turtle Bunbury, Ireland's Forgotten Past: A History of the Overlooked and Disremembered
  • July 24 - Eoghan Daltun, An Irish Atlantic Rainforest: A Personal Journey into the Magic of Rewilding
  • September 25 - Sean O'Driscoll, Heiress, Rebel, Vigilant, Bomber
  • November 27 - Kit De Waal, Without Warning and Only Sometimes

2022

  • January 24 - Rosaleen McDonagh, Unsettled (2021)
  • February 28 - Susan McKay, Bear in Mind These Dead (2009)
  • March 28 - Kathleen, Dominique & Jade Jordan, Nanny, Ma and Me: An Irish Story of Family, Race, and Home (2021)
  • April 25 - Paul McVeigh (Editor), The 32: An Anthology of Irish Working-Class Voices (2022)
  • May 23 - Glenn Patterson, The Last Irish Question: Will Six into Twenty-Six Ever Go? (2021)
  • June 27 - Kerri Ní Dochartaigh, Thin Places (2022)
  • July 25 - Helen Moat, Time of Birds (2022)
  • August 22 - Fintan O’Toole, We Don't Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Modern Ireland – Part 1 (2022) Pages 1-261
  • September 26 - Fintan O’Toole, We Don't Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Modern Ireland – Part 1 (2022) Pages 262-570
  • October 24 - Gillian O’Brien, The Darkness Echoing: Exploring Ireland’s Places of Famine, Death and Rebellion
  • November 28 - Manchán Magan, Thirty-Two Words for Field: Lost Words of the Irish Landscape
  • December 26 - Gerard Dawe, A City Imagined: Belfast Soulscapes (Northern Chronicles)

2021

  • January 25 - Fergal Keane, Wounds: A Memoir of War and Love (2018)

  • February 22 - Dara McAnulty, Diary of a Young Naturalist (2020)

  • March 22 - Tim Robinson, Connemara: Listening to the Wind (2007)

  • April 26 - Darran Anderson, Inventory: A River, A City, A Family (2020)

  • May 24 - Diarmaid Ferriter, On the Edge: Ireland's Off-Shore Islands: a Modern History (2018)

  • June 28 - Lyra McKee, Lost, Found, Remembered (paperback April 2021)

  • July 26 - Doireann Ní Ghríofa, A Ghost in the Throat (2020)

  • August 23 - Mark O'Connell, Notes from an Apocalypse: A Personal Journey to the End of the World and Back (2020)

  • September 27 - Caelainn Hogan, Republic of Shame: How Ireland Punished 'Fallen Women' and their children (2020)

  • October 25 - Emma Dabiri, What White People Can Do Next: From Allyship to Coalition (2021)

  • November 22 - Ian Cobain, Anatomy of a Killing: Life and Death on a Divided Island (2020)

  • December 27 (Rescheduled to 2022) - Helen Moat, A Time of Birds: Reflections on Cycling Across Europe  (2020) 

2020

  • June 22 - Sinéad Gleeson, Constellations: Reflections from Life

  • July 27 - Garrett Carr, The Rule of Land: Walking Ireland’s Border

  • August 24 - Glenn Patterson, Backstop Land

  • September 28 - Ian Maleney, Minor Monuments

  • October 26 - Emma Dabiri, Twisted: The Tangled History of Black Hair Culture (Don't Touch My Hair-Ireland Title)

  • November 23 - Sam McBride, Burned: The Inside Story of the "Cash-for-Ash" Scandal and Northern Ireland's Secretive New Elite

  • December 28 - Sara Baume, Handiwork

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