For the dead are always close by in a life like Mahoney’s. The dead are drawn to the confused and the unwritten, the damaged and the fractured, to those with big cracks and gaps in their tales, which the dead just yearn to fill. For the dead have secondhand stories to share with you, if you’d only let them get a foot in the door.

Mahoney, a handsome Dublin drifter, goes back to his hometown of Mulderrig to discover the long-buried secret of his origins. The townspeople believe his mother left him in an orphanage and then was never heard from again. Did she disappear and start a new life, or was she, as Mahoney suspects, murdered? All he has to go on is a photograph of him and his mother with a few short sentences written on the back.

Himself is an Irish Spoon River Anthology with ethereal descriptions and supernatural interventions. It’s charmingly rural, replete with folklore and eccentric characters, but also eerie with disquiet. My favorite character was Mrs. Cauley, described as a looking like a benign, geriatric spider, boarding in a house among toppling towers of books and old sheet music. She’s tart, but benevolent, and she can drink Mahoney under the table. She takes up Mahoney’s cause to solve the questions of his mother’s disappearance, and her money and chutzpah are just the motivation Mahoney needs. She knows that the ghost of her first love is lurking around. He often loiters in her hydrangeas while she sits in her garden plotting with Mahoney.

I was drawn to this book because of the Irish setting and the endorsement of M. L. Stedman (A Light Between Oceans). Several elements keep this book from being the usual hum-drum mystery: the gothic Irish setting, where the town itself is a living, breathing thing; the peculiar, enigmatic, and often hilarious townspeople that you get to know as well as your own kooky great aunt; and the fact that the dead of Mulderrig are also skulking around, visible only to Mahoney, indulging in their vices and prey to their temptations, even in their spectral forms. The writing in Himself is exceptional. It's rare to encounter such rich, apt characterization or creation of such foreboding atmosphere. There’s a ghost of a little girl whose tinny voice taunts Mahoney, the incessant drum of the bees who murmur about impending storms, and the trees who “hold their own counsel” and dig their taproots deep. They all portend murder as the answer to the mystery of Mahoney’s mother, with more murder to come.

4 stars for the story, 500 stars for the writing. As soon as I picked this one up, I dropped everything else I was reading. It will grab you from the first sentence and won’t let go.

Himself will be published on March 21, 2017. Many thanks to Netgalley, Atria Books, and Jess Kidd for this advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

Debut Author who will blow you away!!
Vivid descriptions like few authors use!
Town of Mulderrig is a place I'd like to visit. I love the description of a library being a literary labyrinth.

I started reading and could not stop until I was done, reading it all in one day!! I will be looking for more by this author.

A unusual story with Irish folklore,twists and turns,humor,mystery.
Mahoney was an interesting intriguing character.

Mahony returns to a town in County Mayo, Ireland, where he was born to find out more about his mother who had been murdered when he was a baby. A wonderful combination of murder, mystery, magic, humour and beautiful writing.

What an absolutely wonderful story! A tale of Ireland, magic, secrets and murder!

Mahony and Mrs. Cauley are a delight as they join forces to dig into the past and expose some pretty juicy secrets as well as what happened to Mahony's mother and just who is his father.

In this tale the dead are as active as the living and as the dead tend to be, they aren't always dependable, but they can stir things up or point one in the right direction.

I laughed, I cried and I loved this story! The lush descriptions of the land and the characters was perfect. A real joy to read!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this book.

The upright citizens of Mulderrig in County Mayo, Ireland, considered young Orla Sweeney to be a curse on their town, so when she and her illegitimate infant son disappeared one day in 1950, they were happy and relieved to accept that she had boarded a bus to Ennismore, and asked no further questions. Twenty-five years later, Orla’s son Mahoney arrives in the town, resurrecting the ghosts of the past – sometimes literally. Aided by the aged, trouble-loving, larger-than-life Mrs. Cauley, and by his own remarkable charm, Mahoney dedicates himself to discovering the truth about his mother. His quest brings upheaval to the whole town, leaving some residents convinced that Mahoney must be stopped at any cost.

Although it’s the puzzle of Orla Sweeney’s fate that lies at the heart of the novel, there’s much more to Himself than a mystery. I loved the lyrical poetry of the narrative, the unexpected bits of magic, and the wild veering between the hilarity of everyday life and the darkness of the human heart. Recommend this to fans of irreverent humor and of magical realism, and to any reader ready for a wild ride through a well-crafted and addictive story.

I've had a very hard time getting into this book. I loved how it started and thought it had great potential, but Mahony just has not kept my interest in his story. I feel like the author is telling me a story instead of letting me live the story through the character. I've set this aside for now, something I rarely do...hopefully I can come back to it with a different view.

A unique and beautifully written story, the description of Mahony's return to the town of his birth incorporates folklore, magic and a strong sense of whimsy. Mahoney does not believe that his mother abandoned him. With some quirky and unusual characters, such as Mrs. Cauley, an aging actress, and Bridget Doosey, Mahony will get to the truth. An impressive debut novel, thanks to Netgalley for the advanced access.

A highly enjoyable read. I found this to be an edgy version of a "cozy mystery". The addition of the ghostly characters made it an interesting mystery and created a deeper characterization for the "real" characters. The Irish colloquialisms and back and forth format of the time and narration make it a bit of a challenge, but the plot and characters are engaging and a little wild, so it is well worth the challenge.

Found on the steps of an orphanage when he was just an infant, Mahony has always believed his mother abandoned him, but now he's had a tip that she may have been killed. Mahony, a criminal with a heart goes looking for the truth about his mother in this charming portrait of Ireland in the 1970s

I'll be perfectly honest. I got this book because I'm obsessed with Jamie Fraser and Outlander. With that said, this book is nothing like that'. So I completely own tht the reason I didn't like this book is my own fault. I did give it a try though. And I probably would have liked it without the dead people. I just have never been a fan of the gruesome.

Oh, how I loved the first of Himself. The writing, the quirky characters, the Brigadoon-ish Irish town which was definitely NOT Brigadoon. I've mentioned before that I'm ambivalent about magical realism--loving some, but mostly not enthralled. The ones I've loved, however, have been marvelous with the perfect balance of magic and real life.

For me, the lyrical prose that makes the acceptance of magic in the real world possible--is the key to whether or not I can slip into the story. Jess Kidd's prose is lyrical and poetic, a mixture of images, humor, and story telling that flows almost like music.

Raised in a Catholic orphanage, Mahoney is 26 when he receives a letter and a photgraph that upends his previous assumptions that he was abandoned by his mother. He leaves Dublin and travels to the small village of Mulderrig to find out more.

His arrival disturbs the village in various ways. The entire village "almost" recognizes him from the first, but his personal charm carries the day... until the villagers realize that Mahoney is Orla's Sweeney's son. Then the secrets that have been long hidden cause a dilemma of emotions.

Almost everyone insists that Orla left the village with her infant 26 years ago, but old Mrs. Cauley becomes Mahoney's ally and abettor, and the two of them--the handsome young man and the fragile, bald old actress--investigate what they believe to be a murder.

Although a little ambivalent about Mahoney, I loved Mrs. Cauley and Bridget. I had several quibbles as the book progressed, but the first half of the book makes everything worth it, and I am eager to hear more from Jess Kidd.

Read in Dec.; blog post scheduled for Feb. 27, 2017

NetGalley/Atria Books

Literary Fiction. March 15, 2017. Print length: 384 pages.

I gave up on this after only a few pages--just too weird.

Wonderful debut novel, lyrical, funny, sad, haunting with a very good mystery and great characters thrown in to boot. I look forward to the authors next book.