Future Popes of Ireland

`Bulging, big-hearted, engrossing ...Writers such as Anne Tyler and Jane Smiley come to mind, or Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections ... Epic in scale and a pleasure to read, Future Popes of Ireland will have no problem finding its congregation' Sarah Gilmartin, Irish Times

`Very moving, highly entertaining, clever and funny' Sunday Times (Ireland)

`Darragh Martin's bustling, bubbly novel plants a flag on terrain Roddy Doyle's Barrytown novels made their own ... a great deal of bittersweet fun' Daily Mail

`You can practically smell the past as it wafts up at you from [these] pages ... and while there's tragedy, and outrage, too, there's whipsmart satire and riotous comedy alongside a type of scholarliness that provides this novel with its zest and ingenuity. Think Zadie Smith. But much funnier' Sunday Independent

`Stylish verve and astute characterisation' Irish Independent

`Funny, warm and full of heart' Image Magazine

`Raucously funny and genuinely moving. It's the depth of the characters which makes Future Popes of Ireland such a compelling, beautifully conceived family saga; the Doyles are going to stay with me as insistently as the people I've met in real life. A humane, deeply witty and intelligent exploration of faith and its contradictions, and a world which combines the quotidian and the metaphysical, in which every object - from a bottle of water to a smartphone to a scratchcard - could be a holy relic. A joy from start to finish' Luke Kennard

`I really enjoyed this story of four siblings who grow up, discover who they are, fall apart, and somehow, against all odds in an Ireland that is itself struggling to emerge from its mired past, find a way back to each other. This is salutary, compassionate, concerned and oh-so-human storytelling at its very best' Alan McMonagle, author of Ithaca

`Well observed, original, gripping, funny and poignant. This novel is a classic' Jo Spain

`Hilarious and timely, a dazzling debut' John Boyne

Originally from Dublin, Darragh Martin now lives in London. He has written several plays and a children's novel, The Keeper, which was shortlisted for Children's Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards in 2013. Future Popes of Ireland is his first adult novel.v