Walking with Ghosts

Having lived in Dublin for half a decade by now, I felt like I was in a dark corner of a pub on a rainy day, with a few pints of Guinness between us, hearing this auld lad with a coarse voice pouring his heart out. A story that is so common in Ireland, so tragic, yet full of life. A story of abuse, of struggle, of unexpressed love and alienation, of great success that goes unappreciated. As many other readers and his fans, I was taken aback by his quest to be authentic. Granted, it's a trait worth pursuing, but if he's lacking authenticity then I don't know what hope is left there for the rest of us.

I didn't have high expectations for this memoir, because most celebrity memoirs are, “huh, cool, moving on” and that's it. This memoir is a different breed entirely. Gabriel Byrne's writing style is very literary, his prose is gorgeous. He turns mundane ruminations and unnoteworthy events into something thought provoking. Sometimes melancholy, sometimes funny, sometimes inspiring, his Irish background is evident the whole way through and the entire thing feels like he's just sitting down telling you some stories.

That said, there were some negatives for me. First is the writing style itself. I'm not sure if the ARC had it formatted strangely or if its authorial intent but the constant paragraph breaks at odd parts took me out of the story he was telling, and I'm personally not a fan of having dialogue in anything besides quotations, call me what you will. Signaling dialogue with a dash just doesn't work for me at all. Tying into this was the nonlinear fashion he wrote this in. Nonlinear writing is fine, but most of the time he would be telling a story from childhood, and then be talk about something 25 years later with almost no context clues. I'm sure he had his reasons, but I want to get lost in his wonderful writing, not spend extra time trying to figure out how this relates to the previous paragraph temporally.

Overall, enjoyable. I think I may pick up the audiobook soon so I can enjoy the incredible turns of phrase and lyrical sensibilities that Byrne has, without having to deal with looking at his style.

Thanks to Net Galley and the Publisher for the free copy in exchange for an honest review!