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From the bestselling author of The Secret Scripture , a heartbreaking story of lost love. Jack McNulty, a former UN observer, has worked around the world and seen extraordinary things but, as he contemplates his return to Ireland after many years, his memories are dominated by his tumultuous marriage to Mai Kirwan. A great beauty with a vivid mind, Mai was also an elusive and troubled soul, stuck in a marriage that couldn't last. The Temporary Gentleman is a powerful account of one man's attempt to come to terms with the savage realities of the past.
About the author
Sebastian Barry was born in Dublin in 1955. The 2018-21 Laureate for Irish Fiction, his novels have twice won the Costa Book of the Year award, the Independent Booksellers Award and the Walter Scott Prize. He had two consecutive novels shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize,
A Long Long Way (2005) and the top ten bestseller
The Secret Scripture (2008), and has also won the Kerry Group Irish Fiction Prize, the Irish Book Awards Novel of the Year and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. He lives in County Wicklow.
Summary
Jack married her, and shared his life with her, but in time she slipped from his grasp. A heart-breaking portrait of one man's life - of his demons and his lost love - The Temporary Gentleman is, ultimately, a novel about Jack's last bid for freedom, from the savage realities of the past and from himself.
Report
'One's heart leaps into one's mouth and stays there . . . Exhilarating.' Charlotte Moore Spectator
