by Kevin Barry

'Kevin Barry is among the brightest and most delightful new voices in Irish fiction' Rick Moody

'It was deadening winter, one of those feeble afternoons with coal smoke for light, but I found myself in reliably cheerful form.  I floated above it all, pleasantly distanced, though the streets were as dumb-witted as always that day, and the talkshops were a babble of pleas and rage and love declared, of all things, love sent out of Ukraine and Chad.  It was midweek, and grimly the women stormed the veg stalls, and the traffic groaned, sulked, convulsed itself, and the face of the town was pinched with ill-ease.  I had a song in my throat, a twinkle in my eye, a flower in my buttonhole.  If I'd had a cane, I would have twirled it, unquestionably.'

Fast girls cool their heels on a slow night in a small town; a bewildered man steps off a country bus in search of his identity; lonesome hillwalkers take to the high reaches in search of a saving embrace.

These are just three of the scenarios played out in Kevin Barry's wonderfully imagined and riotously entertaining stories.  Throw in a lust-deranged poultry farmer, a gigantic taxi driver stricken with chilling visions, a jaded air hostess and a stressed-out genie, and you have a stunning, provocative and richly comic collection from a writer of unique gifts.

There Are Little Kingdoms chronicles life in the towns and cities of a changing land, where a strange new music sounds, where there are many uncertainties and absurdities, but where still there's laughter in the dark - it echoes as compassion.

This is a place where everything is changing, and where everything remains the same.

'Kevin Barry has produced a collection of vibrant, original, and intelligent short stories, and a number of the tales contained in There Are Little Kingdoms deserve to be read and reread, and to outlast the strange years that made them.' The Irish Times

'Kevin Barry is the real thing ... These are truths about ourselves and about the new Ireland' The View, RTE1

'There Are Little Kingdoms is a brilliant example of short story writing at its best' The Sunday Business Post

'magnificent .. This is show-stopping stuff.' The Sunday Tribune

'caustic, quirky and offbeat' Metro

'There are truly great things here.  Expect more.' The Irish Examiner

Published by The Stinging Fly Press in March 2007