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Brian Keaney

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Brian Keaney

Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ Author


Born
in London, The United Kingdom
Website

Genre

Member Since
July 2007


Brian writes novels for adults, young adults and children. HIs latest novel for adults is The Alphabet of Heart's Desire (Holland House Books), based on an incident in the life of the nineteenth century writer and opium addict, Thomas De Quincey


...more

Have Yous All Gone Mad?

I spent the weekend after the British EU referendum at our house in Ireland, on the southern side of the border. I'd hoped to avoid discussing the vote entirely but it was all anyone wanted to talk about. Here's a snapshot of some of those conversations. You may notice a common theme emerging.

In The Post Office
S: You're welcome home, Brian.
Me: Thanks very much.
S: So what do you think of the re Read more of this blog post »
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Published on June 28, 2016 12:44
Average rating: 3.5 · 3,330 ratings · 426 reviews · 50 distinct works â€� Similar authors
The Hollow People (The Prom...

3.51 avg rating — 1,134 ratings — published 2007 — 17 editions
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Jacob's Ladder

3.59 avg rating — 606 ratings — published 2005 — 12 editions
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The Cracked Mirror (The Pro...

3.40 avg rating — 470 ratings — published 2007 — 16 editions
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Los muchachos no escriben h...

3.54 avg rating — 412 ratings — published 1983 — 5 editions
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The Resurrection Fields (Th...

3.39 avg rating — 338 ratings — published 2008 — 11 editions
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The Alphabet of Heart's Desire

3.81 avg rating — 105 ratings — published 2017 — 2 editions
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The Haunting of Nathaniel W...

3.17 avg rating — 77 ratings — published 2008 — 6 editions
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Where Mermaids Sing

3.69 avg rating — 49 ratings — published 2004
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Falling for Joshua

3.59 avg rating — 32 ratings — published 2001 — 2 editions
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Nathaniel Wolfe and the Bod...

3.30 avg rating — 30 ratings — published 2009 — 5 editions
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More books by Brian Keaney…
The Hollow People The Cracked Mirror The Resurrection Fields
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Brian’s Recent Updates

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Upon experiencing a seizure which leads to the discovery of a brain tumour and the reality of increasing memory loss, Holly Dawson embarks upon a memoir which investigates all the personas she has adopted and discarded during her lifetime. Written as ...more
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The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman
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Beginning with the arrival of a knight hoping to join the Round Table, only to discover that King Arthur has just been killed, The Bright Sword swings into its narrative with the same effortlessly engaging voice that Lev Grossman employs in his Magic ...more
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Once the Deed Is Done by Rachel Seiffert
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Set in Northern Germany at the end of World War Two, Once The Deed Is Done examines the impact of the war’s aftermath on a small town as they wait for their menfolk to return from the front. The narrative unfolds primarily through the eyes of Ruth, a ...more
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Good Behaviour by Molly Keane
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Good Behaviour is an excoriating portrait of life of the Anglo-Irish Ascendancy at the beginning of the twentieth century. Representatives of a dwindling and deeply resented class, Molly Keane’s characters exist in a world set apart from the overwhel ...more
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Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton
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A foreign policy specialist who spent over a decade working in the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Chloe Dalton was at a loss when covid hit the UK confining her to her home, a converted barn in the north of England until a chance encounter ...more
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The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley
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There is so much to like about this book. In particular, there’s Kaliane Bradley’s prose which is absolutely fizzing with wit. She has a real gift for snapshot similes. They’re all over the prose:

“He got out of the car and looked up and down the stre
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Gail is a divorced woman in her sixties, living in Baltimore. Three Days in June recounts the events surrounding her daughter’s wedding. In doing so, the narrative also focuses on Gail’s own relationship with Max, her ex-husband, who turns up on Gail ...more
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The Scholar and the Last Faerie Door by H.G. Parry
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Brideshead Revisited meets Harry Potter in this powerfully-imagined, utterly page-turning fantasy set in an alternative England between the wars. Clover, a student from an impoverished background, has managed to get a place at the county's most exclu ...more
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The Party by Tessa Hadley
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The Party is a convincing, if somewhat depressing, portrait of an intelligent girl on the cusp of adulthood just as the nineteen fifties are coming to a close. Intensely aware of the winds of change beginning to blow through the class-bound society i ...more
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Heart, Be at Peace by Donal Ryan
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Donal Ryan has an absolutely wonderful ear for dialogue. His characters' conversation absolutely leaps off the page. It's a real pleasure to read. Unfortunately, however, there are just way too many characters in this novel. To begin with, every chap ...more
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Quotes by Brian Keaney  (?)
Quotes are added by the Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ community and are not verified by Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ.

“It was all very well to pretend you were not afraid of death, Bea thought, but people only said that because they had not looked death in the eye. They had not understood that it meant everything you have always taken for granted and loved without even knowing it-the world around you, the memories you carry with you, your hopes for the future- all of this being extinguished like a candle flame that is blown out. And afterwards, there would be nothing. Not even emptiness. Not even loneliness. Not even pain.”
Brian Keaney, The Resurrection Fields

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Around the World: This topic has been closed to new comments. 2017 - Where in the world have you been? (book finished and review linked) 250 99 Dec 31, 2017 02:06PM  
Historical Fictio...: This topic has been closed to new comments. 2017: What are you reading? 1704 726 Jan 01, 2018 09:17AM  
“The worst part was that, as the years passed, these memories became, in the way you kept them in a secret box in your head, taking them out every so often to turn them over and over, something like dear possessions. They were the key to your unhappiness. They were the evidence that life wasn’t fair. If you weren’t a lucky child, you didn’t know you weren’t lucky until you got older. And then it was all you ever thought about.”
Jeffrey Eugenides, The Marriage Plot

“To understand the world at all, sometimes you could only focus on a tiny bit of it, look very hard at what was close to hand and make it stand in for the whole;”
Donna Tartt, The Goldfinch

“It was queer the way things crept: the night, and these feelings. One was brought up to scorn the tendency to despair. But it seemed that the darkness knew this, and found a way to reach one nevertheless. It was patient and subtle, gauging the heart’s output of light. Her confusion grew, the heart lucent and the mind lucifugous”
Chris Cleave, Everyone Brave Is Forgiven

“The heart was a bicameral thing, both stoical and skittish. Who was to say that it mightn’t endure the years of separation and the abrupt reversals of fate, only to be repulsed by a misaligned vase, by a lipsticked tooth, by a hundredth of an ounce of ash?”
Chris Cleave, Everyone Brave Is Forgiven

1112 Young Adult Fiction for Adults — 10633 members — last activity May 01, 2025 05:26PM
Whatever your age is, if you love reading young adult fiction, then I want to know what you are reading! Let's exchange ideas of good reads, nice idea ...more



Comments (showing 1-8)    post a comment »
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message 8: by Brian

Brian Journey wrote: "Hey I just wanted to say that I loved The Promises of Dr. Sigmundus books! The storyline was so fascinating! I do have some questions though about the ending of the last book: Did any of the things..."

Hi Journey.
I've just startd a Facebook page.
Please Like it if your'e a Facebook member.

Brian


Journey Oh I see! Now that makes a lot more sense...thank you for answering my questions and now I'll have to go back and give "The Resurrection Fields" a 5 out of 5 stars since I understand it now! I am going to have to read some more of your books, for sure:)

Thanks again for helping me out with my questions! And sorry it took me so long to reply hahaha:)


message 6: by Brian

Brian Hi Journey. Thanks for your email. I'm really glad you enjoyed The Promises trilogy. I enjoyed writing it, too. As to your questions, well when Bea rings the bell the world in which the story has taken place is dissolved and a new world takes its place, one in which Bea and Dante still exist but have different life histories. In this new world there is no asylum, just an old hospital that had been closed for years, Doctor Sigmundus is just a character in a book and Bea and Dante may or may not become friends, depending on how things work out


Journey Hey I just wanted to say that I loved The Promises of Dr. Sigmundus books! The storyline was so fascinating! I do have some questions though about the ending of the last book: Did any of the things in the book actually happen to Bea or was she just reading it the whole time? And was Dante still a kitchen boy at the asylum on Tarnager or was that just in the book that Bea was reading? Or was it all just a dream...? I'd love to get some answers when you have the time, but I understand that time is a hard thing to come by these days. Anyway, I really enjoyed reading those books though, I really did:) Thank you for writing them!


message 4: by Brian

Brian Jeannie wrote: "Hi Brian and thanks so much for adding me as a friend! I have several YA authors as friends and love their work. I'll have to check out yours.
Blessings,
Jeannie"


Thanks a lot Jeannie. Great to hear from you!
Best wishes
Brian



Jeannie Faulkner Barber Hi Brian and thanks so much for adding me as a friend! I have several YA authors as friends and love their work. I'll have to check out yours.
Blessings,
Jeannie


message 2: by Maddie (last edited Jun 30, 2008 03:01AM)

Maddie Coulson Hello Im Maddy And I Read Jaocbs Ladder A Few Weeks Ago. I Thought The Storyline Was Good And Interesting But Being Me I Got Confused Near The Middle Of The Book. There Were So Many Questions That I Wanted The Answers To Which Made Me Read On.
What Made You Come Up With Such A Fasinating Story Line As It Is?
Thank-You
Maddy =]


Lucieeee Evansss Just like to say, I read your book a few weeks ago and i found it very interesting and i just couldnt put the book down as i just wanted to keep on reading to see what happend. Very well written
From Lucy


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