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|  | | A Blirt to the End and Other Stories
Thirteen short stories
A Blirt to the End
Donal can’t do anything right, as his wife has frequently pointed out to him. Can he manage the perfect murder and suicide, or will it all end in tears?
A Famous American Poet Meets the New Irish Woman
A largely factual autobiographical tale set in The Suffolk House (as it was then) in Dublin.
Quits
Tommy saved Pat’s life and won’t let him forget it, but Pat finds a way to get even.
Mother Knows Best
Mother Earth is on hunger strike against the stockpiling of “nucular” weapons, but there is an Irish solution to a worldwide problem.
| |  | | A World of Tricksters
The 154 stories come from 29 countries. Most are myths or folk tales; some are factual.
A trick is an action taken for the real (and ideally legitimate, though perhaps illegal) benefit of the trickster or another person against the unjust behaviour of those with the advantage of class, wealth, authority or physical superiority. That benefit can be material – the saving of life, avoiding injury or capture, economic survival – or the preservation of dignity and a positive self-image through mockery or humiliation as a form of psychological revenge: taking the high and mighty down a peg or two.
Stories about tricks are entertaining, but they carry a serious message for the | |  | | Again in Complete Steel
42 poems
| |  | | Au Pair in Ireland
Experiences of au pair girls and boys in Ireland. Cover and ten inside black and white illustrations by Peter Kent.
More than 40 au pairs talk about their experiences, good and bad, with Irish families. They give advice on how to avoid problems and deal with them as they come up. The consensus is: everyone should be an au pair once - but once is enough!
Host mothers also share their insights into how families and au pairs can live and work together in harmony.
This is a supplementary reader at the intermediate level for students of English.
Reader review:
"I quite enjoyed reading this book. It is an informative book for young non-English adults wishing to be au pairs in Irela | |  | | Earn Fire
Earn Fire takes Reynir to Scotland, the Isle of Man, Wales, and finally Ireland, where he is alternately befriended and threatened by a variety of personages from Celtic and Norse mythology.
"The Celts call by the names of gods that hidden something that only reverent eyes can see." - Tacitus, Germania 9
"There is a race of men and a race of gods; both are of the breath of the same mother. Power is the distinction: man is weak, the gods endure. However, in some ways we resemble the immortals, whether in greatness of mind or in physical nature, though we know not what destiny is laid out for us by day or night." - Pindar Nemean 6 (c. 465 BC) | |  | | English Like It Is: Right, Wrong and Changing Usage
Persistent and occasional errors and changing usage (like "English Like It Is") as exemplified in 432 entries. Over 2000 citations in illustration are taken from the four British Sunday "quality" papers, The Sunday Times, The Sunday Telegraph, The Observer and The Independent on Sunday, and The Irish Times, between 1994 and the present. Ninety books and other publications are also quoted for comparison, and 55 usage guides and dictionaries are cited as authorities. Where American usage differs from UK usage, note is taken of the variations.
Second edition, 2021 update
Contents
Note: the Hanged/Hung section contains a graphic description of execution. The Taboo section contains examples of how the papers deal with 4-letter words.
Adopted, Adoptive
Adverse, Averse
Affect, Effect
After, Afterwards
Age (Stone, Bronze, Iron)
Aggravate, Exacerbate
Albeit, “All Be They”
Alibi
All Right, Alright
Alternate, Alternative
Alternative, Option
Although, Though
Amid, Amidst
Among, Amongst, Between
Amount, Number
And/Or
Anyone / Someone ... He / They
br | |  | | Extraordinary Beasts
Ordinary animals doing extraordinary things and extraordinary animals doing what comes naturally to them.
This is a Young Adult print version of Hellhounds and Hero Horses: Beasts of Myth and Legend with the adult bits removed. | |  | | Facets
Collection of poems
33 poems | |  | | Hellhounds and Hero Horses: Beasts of Myth and Legend
245 stories from around the world
Urcos, púcas, the Simurgh, shape-shifters and shape-changers, the Moddey Dhoo, Black Shuck, speaking equine advisors, Bucephalus, Buraq, Babieca, the Phantom White Stallion of Skull Valley, demon cats, the Peruvian Chullachaqui and the Chilean Tue-Tue, fish-people, Laelaps, the Hedley Kow, kelpies, Irish rat-charmers, and many other tales to make you smile or shiver or simply marvel at the ultranatural activities of supposedly irrational animals as reported by presumably rational humans. Illustrated by 17 photos and drawings. | |  | | Irish King and Hero Tales
Traditional medieval Irish legends
Historical Legends
Conaire the Great
The Champion’s Portion (The Feast of Bricriu)
The Bórama (The Cattle Tribute)
The Saga of Maelodrán
The Spear of Maelodrán and the Spear of Belach Durgein
Robert Bruce and the Spider
The Red Hand of Ulster
The Battle Goddess of Clan Turlough
Fionn mac Cumhaill and the Fianna
The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Gráinne
Éachtach’s Revenge
Fionn’s Shield
How Diarmuid Got His Love Spot
The Death of Fionn
Caoilte Laments the Passing of the Fianna | |  | | Once a Hero
A novel in the form of a filmscript:
a romantic thriller with
love, hate, journalism, theatre, bank robbery, murder, kidnapping --
and, of course, a car chase.
Backstory
Ten years ago, Craig’s wife, Marian, ran off to Australia with fellow amateur actor Rob Yardley. To compensate, Craig became the Post’s star reporter and an anti-social humanitarian curmudgeon. Six months ago he was injured when he volunteered to replace a woman hostage in a gunman siege. The woman was killed when Inspector Conway refused to cooperate with Craig’s mediation. Craig was shot and wounded by the gunman, and then he killed the gunman, thereby, in his mind, violating his publicly stated principle of negotiating a non-violent end to sieges.
The story begin | |  | | Over the Wall to the Trinity Ball and other poems
34 poems. This is an ebook edition of Facets, with the addition of "Tomorrow".
Contents
Advice by the Ocean
After Hours Jam
The Boy Killers
Cáit, Between the Lines
A Christmas Star
Complaint Against Acceptance
diamond
Eyes Alone
Facets
Fourth Level Education
Fraction
The Harpmaker’s Jig
Hummingbird
the laming
And the Milk Producers Are on Strike
The Ocean Blesses the Betrothal
Only My Love
Over the Wall to the Trinity Ball
Pegasus
A poem without words
The Race
Reverence
Rowanberry Wine
Snáth Mara
Sunset
Tomorrow
Twinkling
Unfairest Cut
untitled
Why | |  | | Spanish and Basque Legends
76 legends of Spain and the Basque Country from prehistory to the 21st century. 16 pages of colour photos and one black and white photo.
Distributed in Ireland and the UK by Irish Book Distribution.
Distributed in Spain by Bookworld España.
Also available from the author at Richard@RichardMarsh.ie
Translations and adaptations of medieval historical legends, as well as regional and local tales that may or may not have happened in exactly the way the story says. | |  | | Tales of the Wicklow Hills
2000 years of history, myth, legend and local stories
Distributed in Ireland and the UK by Irish Book Distribution.
Distributed in North America by Syracuse University Press.
Also available from the author at Richard@RichardMarsh.ie
Contents
The Naming of Baltinglass – An incident in the 1st-century BC story about the Demon Swine of Drebrenn is set in Baltinglass and gives the town its name.
The Melodies of Buchet’s House – Buchet, an inn-keeper involved in the Demon Swine story, is famously generous.
Saint Kevin and Glendalough – Migratory folk tales and local legends have become attached to the 6th-century historical founder of Glendalough.
Fingal Rónáin – 10th-century historical fiction - a tragic soap opera - set in the 7th century.
Feagh McHugh O’Byrne – The last of th | |  | | The Legends and Lands of Ireland
43 Irish legends profusely illustrated with photographs of the places where the legends happened.
"The Legends and Lands of Ireland is a book for slow times, a journey through the collective unconscious of the Irish race. You cannot speed through Richard Marsh’s rich, nourishing prose, witty, learned, beautiful. If you do, you’ll miss nuggets along the way. ... Mr. Marsh carries his learning lightly, so lightly you might not notice how profound his scholarship is. ... Each picture here is worth a book in itself and every sentence of Richard Marsh is worth a picture."
From the Foreword by Frank McCourt.
Introduction
The Written Sources of the Stories: The Annals and Books
The Story Cycles
The Mythological Cycle
The Ulster Cycle
The Fionn Cycle
The Cycles of the Kings
The Legends in Modern Ireland
Are the Stories True?
Chapter 1 - Myths
The Naming of Baltinglass
The Fate of the Children of Lir
The Dagda and Boann
Grianán Aileach
Ollamh Fodhla
The Second Battle of Moytura
Chapter 2 - Tales of Fionn mac Cumhaill and the Fianna
Aideen and Oscar
Diarmuid and Gráinne
How Fionn Got His Gray Hair
| |  | | The Shore of Two Worlds
Part of the Key-Bearer series
Out of print; to be re-issued in a new edition | |  | | These Things Happen
48 short inspirational radio pieces
Some of these 48 experiences happened to me, others I witnessed as a fascinated bystander, and a few are anecdotes told to me by friends and acquaintances. They remain with me as life-enhancing lessons and valuable insights into the many facets of human and animal personality and character: kindness, generosity, prejudice, determination, courage, pain, sorrow, delight, love and the ability to reach beyond earthly limitations that brings us to our full human (and dolphin) potential.
I have shared these stories with listeners to RTÉ Radio One and readers of The Sacred Heart Messenger i | |  | | Utmost Magpie
The elderly, crippled, deaf, nearly blind ex-Captain of a magpie flock battles to regain the leadership.
In Britain and Ireland, many people believe - though some pretend they don’t - that the sighting of one magpie presages bad luck, and two mean good luck. Here is the full range of magpie prophecies.
One for sorrow, two for joy,
Three for a girl, four for a boy,
(Or: Three for a wedding, four for to die)
Five for silver, six for gold,
Seven for a secret never to be told,
Eight for a wish, nine for a kiss,
Ten for a bird you must not miss.
The unnamed Captain of a flock of magpies has ended the tradition of Mortal Combat for leadership out of a respect |
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