The Story of Ireland: A History of the Irish People Paperback – March 13, 2012

The Story of Ireland by Neil Hegarty is absolutely masterful in the presentation of the history of this beautiful and troubled country for those of us who do not live in Ireland as well as those who do. Hegarty is straight-forward with his commentary yet writes of his beloved country for those of us (like myself) who have visited, but don't have a feel for the dynamics of the Irish people. Hegarty does this for me. His easy to read style and lively dialogue is superb and you are drawn into the story of a country rich in tradition involving both heroes and villians. There is more to Ireland than "The Troubles" and the "Famine" and this book tells the story well. Highly recommended

Most of the book (the part that deals with up through about 1850) was interesting. It filled in a lot of background I wasn't aware of, and the author did a good job of condensing the material and making it enjoyable reading.From there through modern times, though, it was extremely tedious. Imagine someone describing the daily press releases from Republicans and Democrats - that's how interesting the latter part is.

As someone that had very little knowledge of Ireland beyond its geography, I found this book sufficiently detailed enough to quench my interest in having a full understanding of the history, but objective enough that I could take the wording on a topic and intuitively understand that there was probably some VERY strong opinions slanted one way or the other on the incident. That would be secondary reading. There was opportunity to frame the progression differently and make it easier to digest, but the overall flow was well written and kept my interest.

My mother - actually stepmother - is Irish, and her mother and aunt came here from Ireland in the mid-1800's. She knew so well the history of her country as did her aunt and they passed that on to my mom. It greatly increased my understanding of the material in the book which was well done and clear. The Author did a wonderful job of presenting the information impartially. My respect for these people and their struggles, and their search for their real identity has my great admiration and respect. At the same time I found that I lost respect for England. They come out looking like sore losers. Their myths and beliefs in a world of "little people" is wonderful, and the bits of culture they share with us today gives new meaning to positive attitude and can-do.I thoroughly loved the book and would highly recommend it.

Let me start off by saying I love the book. It tells the history of Ireland very well and is a great read. However, I only gave it three stars because of Amazon's handling of it. I order a lot of books from Amazon and this is the second I've received with some sort of damage. Page 175, and on the back 176, were torn down the middle and missing half and the paper cover, I got the hardback version, was rumpled up and folded in places that it shouldn't of been. I won't be sending it back because the rest of the book is intact and a great read, however I really think that especially when shipping with other items, books should be wrapped up to protect them in the future.

First, in praise: I found this volume to be very helpful in giving me a broad overview of Ireland from prehistory to the present (through 2011). Given how woefully ignorant I am of Gaelic language, British and Irish history and Irish culture, this reading gave me just the right amount of (read "dangerous" amount of) information to predicate our trip to Ireland later this year. Kudos on the great timeline in the back of the book! [This book is a companion effort to the five-hour BBC/RTE television series of the same name. I have purchased and viewed the latter, and will review it separately.]Then in complaint: Given my woeful lack of background in Irish history, culture and language (see above), I found elements of this book maddening. Most of these could be easily fixed in a second edition, which I hope there will be. For example: There is no glossary, which is astonishing, given the large number of Gaelic terms used, not to say other Irish idioms. Please provide a glossary in the second edition!Bring better consistency between the text and the map-illustrations. Example: Though the text refers often to "Leinster" and "Munster" these political divisions are nowhere defined or described, nor more importantly illustrated on ANY of the included maps! On the outside possibility that someone picks up this volume as their entre to Ireland and things Irish, isn't it correspondingly possible that the reader doesn't know what some of these terms mean? (In fact, several of the nice maps in the TV series showed both "Leinster" and "Munster" -- so maybe that's the message: If you must know, buy the DVDs!)But back to the positive: If you would like an even-handed, interesting, programmatic review of Ireland, you could do way worse than this book. Just also buy a Gaelic/English dictionary. <wink>

This book tells the story of the complicated history of Ireland better than the any history book that I've ever read. It's detailed, thrilling, recounting of Ireland's suffering, and missed opportunities, makes the Irish heart break.

This was a stunning book. I did a paper for school on the Irish potato famine, and I needed to start with "where is Ireland?" Okay it wasn't that bad, but close. I really did not know the history of the country. My paper required at least 10 sources, and so I was able to compare Hegarty's version of history with 9 other sources, and believe me, it checked out. So the book is historically accurate, thorough, and not in the least politically biased. In all, it is a sweeping saga of the history of a country of proud, strong people. Hurray!

Zeer gedetailleerd,uitgebreid boek.Voor een Nederlandstalige staan er veel "moeilijke" (=niet alledaags gebruikte Engelstalige) woorden in. Voor iemand die op zoek is naar algemene geschiedenis over Ierland zocht ik een meer toegankelijk ,vlot leesbaar boek. Zonder twijfel héél interessant maar een beetje te lijvig voor mij.

Muy útil para mis asignatura de la carrera de Literatura y cultura de Irlanda

Bought this for my brother as he is interested in Irish history and he loved it as it explains everything in an easy to understand format and he’s pleased to say he so learned so much more after reading it. Recommended for anyone who wants an easy to understand factual account of the history of Ireland.

I haven't completed reading the book as yet but so far it meets my expectations, good value.Bill

Long story covering Ireland over the century I found it sometimes confusing trying to get my brain around all the situations, but I guess that is the story of Ireland.