Scan barcode
jaclyncrupi's review against another edition
4.0
Colin Barrett knows exactly what to do with short form fiction. His writing has an electric energy and his characters are perfectly drawn. This is a strong collection.
kieranod's review
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
ambiiumm23's review against another edition
dark
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
siria's review against another edition
- Loveable characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
A collection of short stories set in a fictional small town in Co. Mayo, where the Celtic Tiger's been and gone and hardly affected the lives of Colin Barrett's cast of characters, who work mostly dead-end jobs and lead dead-end lives.
I found Young Skins a bit of a frustrating reading experience. Barrett can turn a phrase when he wants to, and I could easily visualise Glenbeigh in my mind's eye I was reading: the drab council estates, the clatter of pubs, the petrol station with its seedy bathroom.
But this also felt very much like what it is: the first collection of short stories by a guy with an MFA in Creative Writing. Not a lot of variation in tone or voice, no sense of any interest in women's internal lives, some descriptive passages that were laboriously overworked (Please, Colin Barrett, take a break from writing about clouds). And while the dialogue has the vocabulary of rural Ireland down, the syntax was often off—too stagey—and the internal monologues often sound less "working-class GAA-playing guy who scraped a few passes in the Leaving" and more, well... guy with an MFA from UCD. (e.g. "He found me a sinecure as groundskeeper [...] He had seen a talent burgeon under his institution's aegis, and did not want to think it truly snuffed out." Another character thinks of himself as a golem made out of the Connemara dirt and while it's an arresting image, and while I'm not saying no Irish person knows what a golem is, I don't think it's, shall we say, part of the Irish cultural imaginary enough that it's going to be a go-to reference.)
There's enough promise here that I'll give Barrett's work another go—I'm curious about his splashy recent novel—but taken as itself I think Young Skins is a bit over-praised.
I found Young Skins a bit of a frustrating reading experience. Barrett can turn a phrase when he wants to, and I could easily visualise Glenbeigh in my mind's eye I was reading: the drab council estates, the clatter of pubs, the petrol station with its seedy bathroom.
But this also felt very much like what it is: the first collection of short stories by a guy with an MFA in Creative Writing. Not a lot of variation in tone or voice, no sense of any interest in women's internal lives, some descriptive passages that were laboriously overworked (Please, Colin Barrett, take a break from writing about clouds). And while the dialogue has the vocabulary of rural Ireland down, the syntax was often off—too stagey—and the internal monologues often sound less "working-class GAA-playing guy who scraped a few passes in the Leaving" and more, well... guy with an MFA from UCD. (e.g. "He found me a sinecure as groundskeeper [...] He had seen a talent burgeon under his institution's aegis, and did not want to think it truly snuffed out." Another character thinks of himself as a golem made out of the Connemara dirt and while it's an arresting image, and while I'm not saying no Irish person knows what a golem is, I don't think it's, shall we say, part of the Irish cultural imaginary enough that it's going to be a go-to reference.)
There's enough promise here that I'll give Barrett's work another go—I'm curious about his splashy recent novel—but taken as itself I think Young Skins is a bit over-praised.
randiymkje's review against another edition
dark
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
leecrutchley's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
patlo's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
3.5
tom_in_london's review against another edition
5.0
This is more than just another collection of Irish stories about endlessly getting drunk!
Anyone who grew up, as I did, in a God-forsaken provincial town in Ireland where there isn't much to do except get drunk and where sex, if it ever happens at all, is a squalid, unpleasant, guilty affair, will feel uncomfortably back home, reading these deeply absorbing stories, some of which are very short and some long enough to be called novellas. Colin Barrett plays with language very skilfully: his "Diamonds" begins like a delightful half-parody of Raymond Chandler before settling into a strange, hopeless tale of chaotically large families, illegitimate, unwell chldren, and futile murder. Barrett loves language and can write with great lyricism and playfulness; his ability to describe a face or a person, or a river at night, or a squalid unsuccessful pub, or somebody's Adam's apple, will hold you spellbound and fascinated, but sometimes all of this hopeless pathos, this ultimately barren drinking and kicking, describes an Ireland that feels like the dog-end of a Europe that's come to an end here, petering out until it's washed away in the ocean. You wonder if that's all there is, in those towns; but I find this world of working-class young Irishmen and Irish women, out on an alienated edge where whatever's happening in the world is happening somewhere else, far more gratifying and gutsy than the work of certain other effete Dublin writers. I expect and hope for more from Mr. Barrett.
Anyone who grew up, as I did, in a God-forsaken provincial town in Ireland where there isn't much to do except get drunk and where sex, if it ever happens at all, is a squalid, unpleasant, guilty affair, will feel uncomfortably back home, reading these deeply absorbing stories, some of which are very short and some long enough to be called novellas. Colin Barrett plays with language very skilfully: his "Diamonds" begins like a delightful half-parody of Raymond Chandler before settling into a strange, hopeless tale of chaotically large families, illegitimate, unwell chldren, and futile murder. Barrett loves language and can write with great lyricism and playfulness; his ability to describe a face or a person, or a river at night, or a squalid unsuccessful pub, or somebody's Adam's apple, will hold you spellbound and fascinated, but sometimes all of this hopeless pathos, this ultimately barren drinking and kicking, describes an Ireland that feels like the dog-end of a Europe that's come to an end here, petering out until it's washed away in the ocean. You wonder if that's all there is, in those towns; but I find this world of working-class young Irishmen and Irish women, out on an alienated edge where whatever's happening in the world is happening somewhere else, far more gratifying and gutsy than the work of certain other effete Dublin writers. I expect and hope for more from Mr. Barrett.
lqueijo's review against another edition
4.0
Histórias vulgares sobre gente vulgar, relatadas com uma crueza desarmante, colocam Colin Barrett na minha lista de autores a seguir.
Uma colecção de contos sobre situações mundanas, desenroladas em ambiente Irlandês, com uma prosa ora directa ora a puxar pelo lado mais poético mas que se lêem muito bem.
Uma colecção de contos sobre situações mundanas, desenroladas em ambiente Irlandês, com uma prosa ora directa ora a puxar pelo lado mais poético mas que se lêem muito bem.