Sand in Strange Places (Paperback)

Richard Grainger

ISBN 10: 1917837690 / ISBN 13: 9781917837699

Published by Chiselbury Publishing, 2026

About this Item

Paperback. Sand in Strange Places is a darkly humorous memoir of growing up in civil-strife-torn Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s a place defined by religious zealotry and country-and-western-fuelled alcoholism. It is also the story of one boys determination to survive, lose his virginity and to escape the place.Richard recounts a childhood shaped by repression and contradiction: enduring a brutal boarding-school education narrowly avoiding expulsion and once facing the threat of having his testicles cut off by a British soldier. He gives a frank account of the physical and sexual abuse he endured at a supposedly elite preparatory school, now long closed.As an only child, Richard negotiates the hard love and relentless expectations of parents who viewed parenthood as an investment.He relates how his journey from short trousers to flannels took him from academic neo-prodigy to academic failure.And he shares with the reader the often-bumpy sexual road that takes him from boyhood into manhood, his brief but capricious rocknroll career, and how he achieved the recognition that only two other writers (Oscar Wilde and Sam Beckett) managed to achieve.Dark and candid, Sand in Strange Places is a story of sex, school, survival, and escape, set against the backdrop of the Irish Troubles. Sand in Strange Places is a darkly humorous memoir of growing up in civil-strife-torn Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s a place defined by religious zealotry and country-and-western-fuelled alcoholism. It is also the story of one boys determination to survive, lose his virginity and to escape the place. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781917837699

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Sand in Strange Places (Paperback)
• Publisher: Chiselbury Publishing
• Publication Date: 2026
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1917837690
• ISBN 13: 9781917837699
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

“Grainger paints a vivid picture of a turbulent childhood during the Northern Ireland Troubles, told with laugh-out-loud humour.It's a crackin' read.” Cecil Lowry, writer and historian

“A blistering memoir: poignant, sobering and hilarious.” David Roy, author

Sand in Strange Places is a darkly humorous memoir of growing up in civil-strife-torn Northern Ireland during the late 1960s and early 1970s – a place defined by religious zealotry and country-and-western-fuelled alcoholism. It is also the story of one boy’s
determination to survive, lose his virginity and to escape the place.
Richard recounts a childhood shaped by repression and contradiction: enduring a brutal boarding-school education – narrowly avoiding expulsion – and once facing the threat of having his testicles cut off by a British soldier. He gives a frank account of the physical and sexual abuse he endured at a supposedly elite
preparatory school, now long closed.
As an only child, Richard negotiates the hard love and relentless expectations of parents who viewed parenthood as an investment.
He relates how his journey from short trousers to flannels took him from academic neo-prodigy to academic failure.
And he shares with the reader the often-bumpy sexual road that takes him from boyhood into manhood, his brief but capricious rock’n’roll career, and how he achieved the recognition that only two other writers (Oscar Wilde and Sam Beckett) managed to achieve.
Dark and candid, Sand in Strange Places is a story of sex, school, survival, and escape, set against the backdrop of the Irish Troubles.

“It’s a crackin’ read.”
Cecil Lowry, writer & historian

“A blistering memoir: poignant, sobering and hilarious.”
David Roy, author