Irish Times writers review the latest paperbacks.
No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy Picador. £7.99
No one does jacked-up, macho Western rambles these days better than Cormac McCarthy. In a plot-driven script that takes us across Texas to Hell and back, No Country for Old Men is a compelling read with strong, twangy dialogue. It is even rumoured that the gruesome, gun-slinging cast of characters will shortly feature in a new Coen Brothers film - but we should have seen that coming. Rife with technical descriptions of a full arsenal of guns and the grisly injuries they produce, it is an entertaining story nonetheless. Tough men who love their women, these are cowboys through and through, who now run drugs rather than cattle, their way of life essentially unchanged. Nostalgia for the Old West is thick on the ground, but it's hard to believe McCarthy would expose the decline of the genre he has so successfully made his own since All the Pretty Horses. Nora Mahony
DH Lawrence: The Life of an Outsider by John Worthen Penguin Books, £12.99
Sending some of his poems to a literary magazine on a whim, a friend set Bert, the collier's son from the English Midlands, on the way to becoming DH Lawrence, the writer. But the wave of moral and economic conservatism which swept England with the outbreak of the first World War quenched publishers' initial enthusiasm for his groundbreaking writing about sex and relationships. Despite subsequent critical acclaim, his work was (and still is) hugely controversial and he remained outside the British literary establishment, publishing his final novel, Lady Chatterley's Lover, abroad to circumvent the British censors. He lived with his wife, Frieda Weekley, in self-imposed exile, dying of TB, aged just 44, in the French town of Vence. Lawrence is now sometimes branded as sexist, but Worthen reckons his best defence lies in his work. Fionnuala Mulcahy
Just As Well I'm Leaving by Michael Booth Vintage, £7.99
Think Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Mermaid is just an everyday tale of boy meeting fish? Then think again. Andersen was a "towering neurotic" but, despite his neuroses, loved to travel at a time when travel was at best uncomfortable and could be perilous. One reason for his wanderlust was his love-hate relationship with his native Denmark (hence the book's title). He wrote A Poet's Bazaar about one of his longer trips through Germany, Italy, Greece and Turkey and back via the Danube, and Michael Booth describes this work as "a lost classic of travel writing". Booth retraces his hero's journey and the result is a sparkling, moving and funny travelogue that combines insight into Andersen's life and character with a memorable dramatis personae. An ideal holiday read but, beware! You will never feel the same about Andersen and his - what you may once have thought delightful - fairy tales again. Brian Maye
The Colonel of Tamarkan: Philip Toosey and the Bridge on the River Kwai by Julie Summers Pocket Books, £8.99
David Lean's film The Bridge on the River Kwai tells the story of Allied POWs, under the command of the eccentric Col Nicholson, bridging a river on the Burma/Thailand railroad during the second World War. The exploits of the colonel were loosely based on Lt Col Philip Toosey, a Territorial Army volunteer and a remarkable soldier. During the defence and subsequent surrender of Singapore, Toosey's leadership qualities had been recognised, but it was as officer in charge at the prison camp at Tamarkan that his genius for organisation, his diplomacy in dealing with the Japanese and his exceptional bravery, helped save the lives of many hundreds of his men. Drawing on first-hand accounts from those who knew him, Julie Summers's poignant biography does justice to the memory of an exceptional man and a forgotten war hero.Martin Noonan
The Turning by Tim Winton Picador, £7.99
In his novel Dirt Music, Tim Winton wrote with exquisite precision about a pair of lost souls searching for meaning in a deadbeat town on Australia's glorious and wild western coast. He is a compassionate as well as an unflinching observer, always conscious of his characters' humanity as they struggle to survive mid-life disappointment and, often, to come to terms with earlier damage. While hope underlay Dirt Music like a watercolour wash, The Turning, a collection of short stories, is a tougher read. Many of the 17 stories overlap - a minor character in one turns up as the main protagonist in another - so that while each is complete in itself, together they also make a coherent whole. Winton's evocation of his native place, its sights, sounds and smells, is masterful and his tales of the downside of Down Under make a bleakly beautiful collection.Cathy Dillon
The Lost Garden by Mary Stanley Headline Review, £9.99
Mary Stanley's summer offering tells the story of Esme Waters, a woman who presents a carefully constructed façade to the world, whose life has been largely spent running from one man to another and always from her past. As Esme's story emerges through her conversations over coffee with a Parisian psychiatrist - the French are so civilised - we find she is a broken creature. She earns a living lecturing in ethical conduct, but her existential musings are bewildering and quoting from Macbeth fails to lend her story the necessary gravitas. The "garden" of the title is composed of Lily, Rose and Jasmine, Esme's daughters by three different men, and though far from lost, they are often abandoned by their self-obsessed mother. Our curiosity about the root of Esme's imbalance is this over-long novel's greatest friend. Claire Looby