Irish Readers discussion

For those that have read the book and want to chat freely.

Contains spoilers:

So I have just finished this book and I feel an immediate urge to discuss it. There is so much contained within this book. This one epic volume delighted, disgusted and provoked thought and reflection upon Irish society. I shall however, limit myself to commenting on two things.

The first is how brave Paul Murray is to discuss something that has polluted our society for so long - pedophilia. When reading this book I was totally disgusted with the choices that had been made by the various authors, mostly because I think that these were a mirror to the decisions that many people in authority made. We tend to blame the priests for this abhorrence but as Murray points out it was a large proportion of the society that knew about this but did nothing.

The second is that this book reminds me a lot of 'The White Tiger'. They both had similar endings that leave one feeling dissatisfied. Nothing has been resolved and we continue life as was with those at the edge of society being left to plod along, take the blame and rescue each other. I love the way history is woven through this tale and this book is in one way a comment on history itself, we don't learn from it. We make the same mistakes over and over (or for the last 400 years anyway). We talk about the advancement of society but have we really changed all that much?