Catherine Dunne's second novel gives a voice - and a powerful, articulate voice at that - to the sort of contemporary characters which Irish fiction tends to ignore, or leave to the romance writers; the upwardly mobile lower middle classes, whose outward prosperity covers an inner emotional desolation. Farrell begins as a carpenter and ends up doing very nicely out of furniture restoration; his wife Grace begins as the receptionist in her father's firm and makes a fortune out of hand-carved dolls; but their material success, and their apparently blissful marriage, is gradually undone as the sins, real or imagined, of their fathers come home to roost. It may sound like the plot for a romantic novel, but with its sinister undercurrents and clever structuring, A Name for Him- self edges closer to a thriller. Whatever it is, it's impossible to put down.
