Nicola Sturgeon, First Minister
The Heart’s Invisible Furies by John Boyne (Doubleday) is a big, bold and sweeping novel, taking us on a journey through the life of Cyril Avery, from his birth to an unwed Irish mother and adoption by an eccentric Dublin couple (“you’re not a real Avery”, they frequently remind him), through his struggles to come to terms with his homosexuality, navigate his loneliness and find a sense of identity and belonging. As much the story of modern Ireland as it is the life of one man, it opens in the 1940s with Avery’s unmarried mother cast out of her church and community and ends just as Ireland votes to legalise gay marriage – a country making peace with its past and allowing Avery to finally feel at home. It is a beautifully written epic and will make you laugh and cry in equal measure.
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It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
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