Ballinasloe native’s latest novel
The latest novel by a well-known Ballinasloe native deals with the traumatic events of 1691, notably the sieges of Ballymore and Athlone and the battle of Aughrim.
Joe Joyce is a native of Ballinasloe who grew up in Aughrim where his father Martin was principal of the national school.
He worked as a journalist in Dublin for many years, primarily for The Irish Times and The Guardian, and has written five previous novels including the Echoland trilogy of spy thrillers set in Dublin during the Second World War (aka The Emergency) which were selected as Dublin city library's One City One Book in 2017. He is also the author of a play, The Tower, and a non-fiction biography/history of The Guinnesses and co-author with Peter Murtagh of The Boss, the story of Charles Haughey's infamous roller-coaster government in 1982.
His latest novel, 1691, brings to life a seminal year in Irish history, following two opposing generals, Patrick Sarsfield and Hugh Mackay, through the year that saw the battle of Aughrim and four sieges and whose consequences still influence Irish life.
It’s the book his father Martin, a historian of the battle of Aughrim, the Co Galway village where the Joyce family lived, meant to write but never got around to during his lifetime. (The collection of artefacts from the battlefield Martin built up form the centerpiece of the collection in the village’s visitor centre).
The novel opens in May 1691 as the decisive year of the war in Ireland is about to get underway. The armies of the English King James and his Dutch usurper King William are on the move again, resuming where they left off for the winter.
The Jacobites have been pushed westwards beyond the River Shannon following their defeat at the battle of the Boyne the previous year. But they are far from beaten.
Through the personalities of two opposing generals, the Irish Patrick Sarsfield and the Scottish Hugh Mackay, 1691 brings to life the sieges of Ballymore, Athlone, Galway and Limerick and the battle that determined Ireland’s future for centuries.
The friendships and feuds, conspiracies and alliances, strategies and tactics are explored in a readable fictional account that is true to the historical record.
Says Joe “Writing history as fiction provides new perspectives on historical figures, their motives, decisions, and actions. I believe it enhances our understanding of their dilemmas and it challenges our natural assumption that everything that happened was inevitable.”
Paperback and ebook editions available directly from the author at www.joejoyce.ie, selected bookshops, and from Amazon at https://amzn.to/3bQmI7D