‘Wild Houses’ by Colin Barrett    (2024) – 255 pages

At the center of ‘Wild Houses’, the new novel by Irish author Colin Barrett is the hapless Dev Hendrick. Dev is in his late thirties. He lives by himself and keeps to himself out on his family farm, outside of town. He loved his mother, but she died a few years back.

“She could bear in on him of course, could berate, hound, and guilt-trip him like any mother, but she was the only living presence he could bear when he was at his lowest. Which was often. For as far back as he could remember, he had been prone to long consuming lows, but only ever felt half-alive, and half the time he wasn’t even that. It was the mother who kept him going during the worst years. She had.”

Only an Irish novel would have an unfortunate case like Dev as its “hero”. That is why I really like good Irish novels such as ‘Wild Houses’. I like that the characters in these novels are not defined by their income or their position, but instead are allowed to wander their own ways. I find it humorous yet realistic. Happily or sadly, they are humans.

Dev did have a job but quit it without a good reason back when his mother was still alive. His father is housed in town where they keep the severe mental cases. Dev has never gone to visit his father.

The drug dealers in town store their drugs they are going to sell on Dev’s remote farm after he gave them permission to do so. Now two of them, Gabe and Sketch Ferdia, show up on Dev’s farm unannounced. They have kidnapped a young guy, Doll English, who is still in high school. They are going to keep Doll at Dev’s farm, because Doll’s older brother Cillian English who is also a drug dealer owes them money. If Cillian doesn’t pay up, Doll’s life is in danger.

Most of the male characters are either criminals or mental cases. The women are given a little more leeway. Nicky, the main female character is a bartender at one of the town’s many pubs. The young guy Doll had been out at the town bars with Nicky. They got separated that evening, and Nicky at first doesn’t realize that Doll’s been kidnapped. Nicky winds up at the final showdown.

There is very little explication or explanation of actions, thoughts, or feelings in ‘Wild Houses’. Colin Barrett does not force his characters to be a certain way. They are who they are, and nothing more can be said.

So what we have here is a wild Irish crime novel with offbeat characters. While this cast of off-the-wall crazies makes for an amusing fun ride, ‘Wild Houses’ also works as a well-plotted crime story.

Grade:    A

‘Homesickness’, stories by Colin Barrett   (2022) – 213 pages

I wanted something a little lighter and less intense than my recent reading and I found it in the collection of stories ‘Homesickness’ by Colin Barrett. What stands out is the expressiveness of many of these stories’ sentences.

In the story “The Alps”, we have this description of the three Irish Alps brothers, Rory and Eustace and the youngest Bimbo:

“The Alps were not men comfortably acquainted with the carnal, but they could become as fissured and rent with yearning as anyone.”

And here’s more on the Alps brothers:

“The Alps still felt young in their souls but it was the bloodshot eyes, pouched necks and capitulating hairlines of middle age that leered back at them from mirrors. They ate too much takeaway, slept fitfully, downed vats of Guinness every weekend.”

In ‘The Silver Coast’, a woman, her mother, and her friends attend a funeral luncheon in January while her husband and son dispose of the Christmas tree.

“Lydia Healy? Having a tumultuous affair? A woman who when you looked at her, made you think of terms like beetling and doughty, words that were archaic and obscure and cumbersome and probably didn’t mean what you thought they meant.”

But “the world is filled with unaccountable things if you’re keeping track”.

These stories are often told in a humorous vein, but several of them have a sad twist which is something I associate with Irish fiction in general.

One characteristic which all of the stories share is that they have open-ended endings. By this I mean that you get the sense that the real story continues after the written story ends. Life goes on. This is probably more realistic than to end a story with a more conclusive final ending. I like it.

‘Homesickness’ had for me that good effect when I am looking forward and anticipating what Colin Barrett would do with his next story. It was a pleasure to skip around from story to story.

Grade:   A