The Amusements

The Amusements kept me up half the night. Aingeala Flannery is a brilliant writer. Her sentences crackle with life, energy and devastating insight into the human condition. She writes with a rare combination of compassion and black humour. Her characters live on in my mind like people I have always known

Lia Mills

Its effortless evocations of the tides and pulls of small-town life are note perfect . . . It's often very funny, sometimes sad, always authentic and perceptive, and hugely entertaining. Beautiful

Donal Ryan

The writing, so true to small-town life, is both shrewd and enlarging. Flannery writes like a grown-up; her flawed, hopeful characters live and grow on the page

Anne Enright

A cracker of a book. Think Kevin Barry crossed with Elizabeth Strout. The writing is that good

Kathleen Mac Machon

[The setting of] Tramore is not only a character - it is the main character of The Amusements, with its quotidian dramas and failed epiphanies and the magnetic pull it has over everyone who encounters it, from those on a family holiday, to those who are born, bred and die there. It was a joy to read

Louise Nealon

A fresh, funny, fiercely Irish novel about the vagaries of friendship, and Aingeala Flannery - wholly in charge of her lovable, eccentric cast - writes like a dream

Nuala O'Connor

A vibrant, evocative debut that brings the exploits of an Irish coastal town brilliantly to life

Sarah Gilmartin

A deft collage of a novel. Ambitious and fun . . . a wonderful debut

Alan McMonagle

A brilliant book. I loved meeting all these characters, who jumped off the page and stayed in my head. Aingeala Flannery is a real talent

Róisín Ingle

A fantastic debut novel . . . it paints a vivid picture of this seaside town, we were gripped

Stellar

If you like dark humour, superbly drawn characters, caravan parks, fish suppers and slot machines, The Amusements is what you've been waiting for

Jan Carson

[Flannery] skilfully observes life in a small town and roads that are dreamed of but not taken. Characters that have a great sense of longing & yearning to leave this town behind, and yet somehow always get pulled back. A great read!

Sinéad Moriarty

As addictive as slot machines and as exhilarating as waltzers. A great sense of place and compelling characters

Martin Doyle

[Carries] notes of Donal Ryan and Roddy Doyle for me . . . A nostalgic masterpiece, loaded with possibility and weighed down with reality, guaranteed to be this summer's must-read

Waterford News and Star

Sharp as a vogue tomato slicer, it's seaside Ireland minus the dreary caravan mentality or sentimentality

June Caldwell

If you buy just one novel next month make sure to buy Aingeala Flannery's debut. Funny, sad and most of all beautifully written

Eoin Devereux

A compelling and satisfying read

Hot Press

Brilliant

Irish Daily Mail

I loved it - so good

Elaine Feeney

A fascinating portrait of small-town life. A joy to read

Sunday Independent

Glorious

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Brilliant. Dramatic, heartfelt, sometimes shocking and sad

Sue Leonard, Irish Examiner

Beautiful

Ryan Tubridy

Like [William] Trevor, a wry wit permeates Flannery's storytelling

Irish Times

Flannery's depiction of the sounds, smells and seediness of the typical seaside resort is sharp and vivid

Sunday Times

Charming and empathetic . . . Flannery's immense skill lies in her ability to inhabit such a wide range of characters, stepping into their shoes and capturing the nuance of each voice, each set of hopes and dreams and private, devastating heartaches

Independent

Unputdownable . . . one of the best novels of the year

Estelle Birdy, Sunday Independent

THIS BOOK is EVERYTHING. The characters are painfully, beautifully real, the writing is IMPECCABLE. Brutally honest about what we want for ourselves versus what we actually get, I LOVED it

Marian Keyes

Blackly funny

Business Post

Impossibly compelling

RTÉ Culture

My book of the year . . . I loved every page

Gearóid Farrelly

Flannery excels at working that counterpoint of dark and light, comedy in the face of tragedy . . . A brilliant debut

Anglo-Celt

Quietly beautiful . . . Flannery's characters are very well drawn, as is her understanding of small-town mores and idle gossip. It's a book that leaves and impression long after the final page

Irish Independent

An amazing story

Amie McAuley, Belfast Telegraph