Himself

Product Information

Your name is Francis Sweeney. Your mammy was Orla Sweeney. You are from Mulderrig, Co. Mayo. This is a picture of yourself and her. For your information she was the curse of the town, so they took her from you. They all lie, so watch yourself, and know that your mammy loved you. This is an ambitious and enjoyable debut by Jess Kidd. I applaud her for bringing her musical prose to the mystery genre and look forward to seeing what she writes next. A very quirky novel, Jess Kidd has a distinctive style that is difficult to describe. The tone and language were everything in this novel. The humor lightened up what is a serious murder mystery and brought in much needed levity. The language and descriptions oozes charm.

Himself by Jess Kidd review – a dark and rollicking debut

So what went wrong? As it's often happens with great story, stupid characters doing stupid shit. Like can we not have a male MC who is so “handsome” and so “flawless” that women of all ages ranging from 14 year old to 60 are ready to become his sex slave without actually giving any real insight as to what makes him so special? Also can we not have female characters whose sole purpose in the story is to pine over a dude who has no interest over her whatsoever? Mahony increases his smile to show his teeth in an expression of considerable natural charm altogether capable of beguiling the hardest bastard of humankind. “Well, the last thing I need is work. I’m taking a break from the city.” Himself starts off dark and violent and left us wanting to stay hidden in those magical bushes to hide from the dark but soon humor is introduced into the story to lighten the darkness of this story. Jess Kidd does a good job balancing the dark with some light here with magic and humor. Another sweltering month in Charlotte, another boatload of mysteries past and present for overworked, overstressed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan.Irrespective of the fact that he constantly receives resistance from a village, which harbors secrets, lies and a killer, Mahony is more than determined to figure out what exactly happened to his mother. Mahony eventually finds himself protected and allied to a group of Irish women that no one would want to mess with. Mrs. Cauley is an exceedingly strong and frail elderly actress, who possess a magical library and insists on looking into Orla’s sudden death. She is a woman who is not afraid of shaking qualms to see what will fall out. Furthermore, she is also not afraid of the danger that lurks. Mahony’s landlord is Shauna, and she happens to fall in love with Mahony. She is more than determined to ensure that no harms fall in the way of Mahony.

Himself by Jess Kidd - Publishers Weekly Himself by Jess Kidd - Publishers Weekly

Jess Kidd shares her story in writing that is lovely, inspired, ingenious, and quintessentially Irish in the colloquial expressions. The mysterious mystical setting revealed with enough cleverness and wit to keep the heebie-jeebies at bay. Her characters are complex, including the intimidating local priest to Mrs. Cauley, a rather unconventional, wealthy, former theatre actress who is not afraid of much, and who takes Mahoney a bit under her wing. Himself is Jess Kidd's confident, engaging debut novel. It has a captivating ensemble cast, great jolts of humor and danger, hair-raising plot twists and just enough darkness to make the magic feel true. A thoroughly enjoyable read." From the moment he sets foot in Mulderrig, Mahony's presence turns the village upside down. His uncannily familiar face and outsider ways cause a stir among the locals, who receive him with a mixture of excitement (the women), curiosity (the men), and suspicion (the pious).At this time of the day the few shops are shuttered and closed, and the signs swing with an after-hours lilt and pitch, and the sun-warmed shop front letters bloom and fade. Up and down the high street, from Adair’s Pharmacy to Farr’s Outfitters, from the offices of Gibbons & McGrath Solicitors to the Post Office and General Store, all is quiet. Because even for all of the novel's warmth and whimsy, there is also a profound darkness to it. The story is not all fun and games. Although brief, there are a few scenes of violence that I found to be gut-wrenchingly disturbing.

Jess Kidd - Book Series In Order Jess Kidd - Book Series In Order

Debut novelist Kidd paints a darkly magical tale of a man who revisits his birthplace of Mulderrig, a small coastal town in Ireland, to investigate the mysterious circumstances of his mother’s death 26 years earlier. Mahony’s mother, Orla, was a ragtag single mum with supernatural powers that townspeople found unsettling. But was that cause for her to be murdered? Or was there more to it? And what forces were at work when Mahony was spared the same fate as his mother the night she disappeared in the woods? Joining Mahony on his quest for answers are three women who add even more color to this richly drawn mystery about a town with more than its share of secrets. There’s Mrs. Cauley, a feisty elderly actress with mystical powers of her own. Shauna is one of Mahony’s many female admirers. And Orla’s old friend Bridget joins the investigative team. When Mrs. Cauley stages a play with Mahony as the lead, she hopes it will lead to answers but instead unleashes a hell storm upon Mulderrig. The Irish hero finally gets the answers he has been searching for but not in the way he expects. Told in a unique voice with complex characters, the paranormal mystery will keep readers guessing whodunit until the very end—all while falling in love with the quirky cast. What do you think we should take away from Orla’s story? Had Orla been a man (i.e., Mahony’s father), how might the story have played out differently? Despite the fact that Jess Kidd was born and raised in London, her family is from the small town of Mayo. Deal’s familiarity with the landscape and dialect as well is evident in her writing. Jess Deal possess an exceedingly lovely and unforceful style. Immediately after completing her undergraduate degree from Open University, Jess Kidd was blessed with a daughter. Kidd continued to study and work part-time before she eventually received her Ph.D. in creative writing studies. Jess Kidd’s dissertation focused on the ways and manner is which disparate genres and modes can be brought into correspondence so as to create new hybrid forms of crime fiction. For Mulderrig is a place like no other. Here the colors are a little bit brighter and the sky is a little bit wider. Here the trees are as old as the mountains and a clear river runs into the sea. People are born to live and stay and die here. They don’t want to go. Why would they when all the roads that lead to Mulderrig are downhill so that leaving is uphill all the way? Set in the 1950’s and the 1970’s, Himself is a fairytale of folklore. It’s endearing, dark, beguiling, and utterly charming to no end. In truth, it is not the type of book I would normally read. Whimsy, fantastical is not my style - but I must say this: it pulls the reader in from the first sentence. You can’t tear your eyes away. The prose is absolutely flawless, beautiful even. The characters are lovely, comical & ensnaring. In short, this novel is not to be missed.

This moves mostly between the two main time periods of 1950, as in the prologue, and 1976, when Mahony arrives from Dublin. Kidd thoughtfully puts the date at the beginning of each chapter (thank you). With “Himself,” Jess Kidd bewitches the reader. I, for one, am glad I fell under his spell. I hope you will consider doing the same.

Himself by Jess Kidd | Waterstones

Mahony turned over the photograph and studied her face. God, she looked young. He would have put her as his sister rather. She couldn’t have been more than fourteen. The bed is carved from dark wood and is horribly ornate. At the head of it stands a dead man holding his hat against his chest. The dead man looks up at Mahony with his eyes low-lidded and full. Mahony sees the famished hollow of his cheeks and the sad drape of his moustache. The dead man lifts his eyebrows imperceptibly then his gaze sinks down again to rest on the floor. Mahony’s story is told in tandem with Orla’s, the teenage girl destined to meet a messy end in the forest. There’s a good deal of wit and some sparkling dialogue as Kidd sketches in the village’s inhabitants. She hops nimbly between timelines and has imagination to spare. The forest feels alive at times. There is magic in the air. But the story becomes rather baggy and tangled in its middle section. There’s simply too much going on and focus is lost. For Mulderrig is a place like no other. Here the colours are a little bit brighter and the sky is a little bit wider. Here the trees are as old as the mountains and a clear river runs into the sea ”His arrival causes cheeks to flush and arms to fold in disapproval. No one in the village - living or dead - will tell what happened to the teenage mother who abandoned him as a baby, despite Mahony's certainty that more than one of them has answers. I had a really tough time believing every female in the town of Mulderrig found Mahoney so irresistible. I got kind of tired hearing about how ridiculously good looking he was. start to convey Mrs Lavelle out of the hall with the tenacity of a swarm of worker ants seeing off a trespassing wasp” Mulderrig is a small Irish village, a Brigadoon of sorts. One spring day in 1976, Mahony arrives in Mulderrig from Dublin, where he has lived all of his life. Or most of his life. Because just recently, he found out that one of his chief nemeses at the orphanage where he was raised, Sister Veronica, left him an envelope when she died. And in this envelope was news which changed his life: a picture of him as an infant with his mother, telling him his real name, and that he is from Mulderrig. The note also said that his mother was "the curse of the town," so they took him from her.