Beatlebone by Kevin Barry

Beatlebone
Kevin Barry

Doubleday

John Lennon – a legend in his lifetime, lives a life in his own legend. It’s May, 1978. John is thirty-seven, going on thirty-eight, and he hasn’t written music worth the name for years.

“For fans of Lennon, and fans of contemporary Irish literature in general, this is a book for you.”

 With middle age creeping up on him he feels adrift and uncertain about who or what he is. Memories of his youth in Liverpool haunt John’s mind. Seeking answers to life’s difficult questions John arrives by night in the west of Ireland. Evading the press pack, he intends to visit the island in scenic Clew Bay he bought years before at the height of the Beatles’ fame. Maybe a spell of solitude on the edge of the world will give him what he needs.

Rural Ireland has some surprises for John. Putting himself in the hands of Cornelius O’Grady, a man with more than a touch of the arcane about him, he embarks on a magical mystery tour of his own. A singing dog, strange people in Victorian garb and a hotel that’s one big blast from the past – Primal Scream therapy has nothing on Irish life in the raw. Will John’s journey allow him to reconcile the past with his present and enable him to write the music he craves to write?

With the Celtic earthiness of Roddy Doyle leavened with the Celtic lyricism of Dylan Thomas, Beatlebone is an imaginative jaunt through the mind of one of the greatest singer-songwriters in history. For fans of Lennon, and fans of contemporary Irish literature in general, this is a book for you.

Reviewer: Cindy A. Matthews