Showing results by narrator "Kate Binchy" in All Categories

Dee loves her children very much, but now they are all grown up, shouldn't they leave home? Rosie moved out when she got married, but it didn't work out, so now she is back with her parents. Helen is a teacher, and doesn't earn enough for a place of her own. Anthony writes songs, and is just waiting for the day when someone will pay him for them. Until then, all three are happy at home. It doesn't cost them anything, and surely their parents like having a full house?

The Italian evening class at Mountainview School is like hundreds of others starting up all over the city. But this class has its own special quality - as the focus for the varied hopes and dreams of teacher and pupils alike. Aidan Dunne needs his new evening class project to succeed almost as much as his pupils do. They too are looking for something more: Bill to find a way to keep spendthrift Lizzie at his side and Fran to make sure that young Kathy finds her way out from behind the kitchen sink.

Irish writer Maeve Binchy was one the best-loved and most successful authors of her time. Her bestselling books sold over 40 million copies worldwide, and were translated into 37 languages. This comprehensive anthology of her finest fiction, as heard on BBC Radio, demonstrates all the warmth, wit and compassion that made her so popular.

Maeve Binchy's best-selling novels not only tell wonderful stories, they also give an insight into how Ireland has changed over the decades but how people remain the same: they still fall in love, sometimes unsuitably; they still have hopes and dreams; they have deep, long-standing friendships, and some that fall apart. From her earliest writing to her most recent, Maeve's work has included wonderfully nostalgic pieces and also sharp, often witty writing which is insightful and topical.

This Year It Will be Different brings us the magic and spirit of Christmas in 15 stories filled with Maeve Binchy's trademark wit, charm, and sheer storytelling genius. Instead of nostalgia, Binchy evokes contemporary life; instead of Christmas homilies, she offers truth; and instead of sugarplums, she brings us the nourishment of holidays that precipitate change, growth, and new beginnings.

In this extraordinary collection of stories, the world-wide best-selling author of Evening Class once again reveals her incomparable understanding of matters of the heart. In The Return Journey, Maeve Binchy creates powerful compelling stories of love, loss, revelation, and reconciliation.

Here is a great gift of wisdom and humour for anyone coping with actual aches and pains. Based on the author's own experience as a hip-replacement patient, she provides funny insider advice about coping with the ordeals of surgery, a hospital stay, and at-home convalescence.

Edith Œnone Somerville and 'Martin Ross' (the pen name of Violet Florence Martin) were cousins, born into the Irish landed gentry in the mid-19th century. They began writing books together as a joke, but quickly developed into serious artists, producing several works now recognised as classics such as The Real Charlotte and Some Experiences of an Irish RM. This collection includes both those titles, alongside The Silver Fox, described as their ‘miniature masterpiece’, and a fascinating biographical drama telling the story of their writing partnership.

In 'Homecoming', read by Sean Campion, the Brennans run Quentin's restaurant in Dublin for the owner, who lives abroad. But what will happen when he suddenly pays a visit? 'Telling Stories', read by Joanna Myers, sees Irene's fiancé turning up the night before the wedding with a face as white as the dress that is to be worn the next day. Then trouble starts....

When a new highway threatens to bypass the town of Rossmore and cut through Whitethorn Woods, everyone has a passionate opinion about whether the town will benefit or suffer. But young Father Flynn is most concerned with the fate of St. Ann's Well, which is set at the edge of the woods and slated for destruction.

Roger is a writer of children's books, and all he wants is a quiet life. But when his wife, Julia, has to stay in hospital, Roger has to deal with his own complications: his difficult mother-in-law, her companion, Otto, and pressures from the publisher about the work he may or may not be about to hand in. It should be easy enough for a grown man to cope at home alone, but no one wants to make it simple for him, whether it's battles to get into Julia's visiting hours or temptations Roger never expected to face at his age.

In a Greek tavern, high over the small village of Aghia Anna, four people meet for the first time: Fiona, an Irish nurse; Thomas, a Californian academic; Elsa, a German television presenter; and David, a shy English boy. Along with Andreas, the old man who runs the taverna, they become close to each other after witnessing a tragedy when a pleasure steamer catches fire in the harbour.<

Among the many evening classes starting all over Dublin is an "Introduction to Italian". On the surface, it could be just one of hundreds in which some students will succeed and some will fall along the way. But the Italian class at Mountainview School has its own special quality, and the hopes and dreams of so many people are tied up in the twice weekly lessons.

Every Friday night, the same seven Dublin workers meet to travel home in Tom Fitzgerald's lilac-coloured minibus. Each of them needs to return regularly to Rathdoon: Nancy Morris, a real "Miss Mouse", is known for her meanness and has to escape her flatmate's carping; Dee Burke is engrossed in her affair; Kev Kennedy has a side to his character hidden even from his family; Celis Ryan has to face her mother making a drunken exhibition of herself; and Tom has his reasons.

Stories about ordinary people going about ordinary lives will always be fascinating when told by a writer blessed with extraordinary talent, insight, and compassion. This Year It Will Be Different brings us the magic and spirit of Christmas in 15 stories filled with Maeve Binchy's trademark wit, charm, and sheer storytelling genius.

This is the story of two very different children growing up in a small Irish seaside town in the 50s and 60s, shouting their hearts' desires into the echo cave, praying that their destiny will lead them far away from the town in which they live. Castlebay, in winter empty and grey with wind and sea spray, becomes all bustle and colour in the gaudy days of summer. The paths of these two characters are destined to criss-cross in a quite unforeseen way, and eventually both roads will lead back to Castlebay.

In this extraordinary collection of stories, the world-wide best-selling author of Evening Class once again reveals her incomparable understanding of matters of the heart. In The Return Journey, Maeve Binchy creates powerful, compelling stories of love, loss, revelation, and reconciliation.

Every table at Quentins Restaurant has a thousand stories to tell: tales of love, betrayal and revenge. Ella Brady wants to make a documentary about the renowned Dublin restaurant that has captured the spirit of a generation and a city in the years it has been open. In Maeve Binchy's magical Quentins, you will meet new friends and old: the twins from Scarlet Feather , the signora from Evening Class, Ria from Tara Road - and a host of fresh faces.

Rory and Ita, Roddy Doyle's first nonfiction book, tells, largely in their own words, the story of his parents' lives from their first memories to the present. Born in 1923 and 1925 respectively, they met at a New Year's Eve dance in 1947 and married in 1951. They remember every detail of their Dublin childhoods, the people, the politics, idyllic times in the Wexford countryside for Ita, for Rory, his apprenticeship as a printer.

By the school house at Shancarrig stands a copper beech, its bark scarred with the names and dreams of the pupils who have grown up under its branches. This tree is the gateway to Maeve Binchy's marvellous portrait of a small Irish town whose untroubled surface conceals the passions, rivalries, friendships, ambitions, and jealousies beneath.