Allen & Unwin There Are Little Kingdoms book Fiction English Paperback 160 pages

The debut short story collection from the winner of the Impac Award, the Goldsmiths Prize and the Sunday Times EFG Short Story Award: 'The most exciting Irish short story writer of his generation' Sunday Times

This award-winning story collection summons all the laughter, darkness and intensity of contemporary Irish life. A pair of fast girls court trouble as they cool their heels on a slow night in a small town. Lonesome hillwalkers take to the high reaches in pursuit of a saving embrace. A bewildered man steps off a country bus in search of his identity - and a stiff drink. These stories, filled with a grand sense of life's absurdity, form a remarkably surefooted collection that reads like a modern-day Dubliners.

Kevin Barry is the author of the novels Beatlebone and City of Bohane and two short story collections, Dark Lies the Island and There Are Little Kingdoms. He was awarded the Rooney Prize in 2007 and won the Sunday Times EFG Short Story Prize in 2012. For City of Bohane he was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award and the Irish Book Award, and won the Author's Club First Novel Prize, The European Prize for Literature and the IMPAC Prize. Beatlebone was the winner of the Goldsmiths Prize and was shortlisted for the Irish Book Awards.