Skintown - Softcover

McMenamin, Ciaran

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1781620393 ISBN 13: 9781781620397

Publisher: Doubleday Ireland, 2017

Synopsis

‘As I force myself into the back row of the scrum I spot a figure on the ground through the massed ranks of denim legs. It’s bad to go down this early. Rule number one is to stay on your feet, and rule number two is to use those feet to run for your fucking life.’

Vincent Patrick Duffy (Vinny to his friends and family) is having a bad night. All he wanted was a Hawaiian burger from one of the choice joints on Chippie Street. Just a few hours later, after a mindless act of kindness, Vinny somehow finds himself wedged into the back seat of a shiny black Ford Fiesta, two prime cuts of under-the-influence thuggery watching him from the front.

Perspective is everything in a divided town where a bottle is as likely to be filled with burning petrol as it is with beer. And there’s nothing that can shift perspective more than the high adrenaline rush of an all-night rave and blissed-out sex, where all divisions dissolve along with inhibitions and most of your clothes. The morning after is going to hurt like hell.

Skintown is Vinny’s drink- and drug-fuelled odyssey through fights, riots, fishing, ecstasy, sex and acid house. Bristling with a restless energy, this superb debut is a wild ride of a novel.

About this title

About the Author:

Ciarán McMenamin was born in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, in 1975. A graduate of the RSAMD, he has worked extensively for the past twenty years as an actor in film, television and theatre. He lives to fish. Skintown is his first novel.

Review:

"A supercharged riot of a debut novel, zinging with confidence and intelligence." -- Joseph O'Connor "Ciaran McMenamin writes brilliantly. His characters are achingly vivid and entirely credible and the pacing is Olympian. Horrifying and hilarious, Skintown is a compulsive read." -- Liz Nugent "McMenamin writes with verve and honesty. . . it lures the reader into the madcap night and then delivers a hairpin twist." -- Sarah Gilmartin * The Irish Times * "Exhilarating. . . . A TNT-powered head-rush of a novel soaked in the smell of burning tyres and set to the MDMA beat of 1990s rave culture. . . . Vinny is a hugely witty companion." * Metro * "I read the first page of this and was immediately hooked. It's rattlingly written, hugely immersive, funny too. Adored it." -- Rick O'Shea * Rick O'Shea Book Club *

About this edition

• Publisher: Doubleday Ireland
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 1781620393
• ISBN 13: 9781781620397
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288