The Irish Times reviews a selection of Paperbacks
Big Fat Love Peter Sheridan Tivoli, 13.99
Dubliner Philo Nolan, née Darcy, is so big that even Evans's size 26 won't fit her, and that's the least of her troubles. Philo's life becomes hopelessly complicated when she flees her drunken thug of a husband and ends up putting her children into care, and seeking refuge for herself at the local convent under the guise of a sudden and late vocation. Sheridan's lovingly evoked heroine then leads us at a headlong pace through Blind Date for Old Folks, sing-songs, car-racing at Santry, toe amputation, bingo, and a cremation that goes horribly wrong. Philo touches those around her with her capability and ability to love but can she solve her own intractable problems? A breezy summer read with a subtle undertow of seriousness about the life-disfiguring effects of abuse, and a quietly observed requiem for a North Wall changed beyond imagining. - Yvonne Nolan
Mountains of the Mind: A History of a Fascination Robert Macfarlane Granta, £8.99
Why are we so moved by mountains? Our ancestors would have been appalled by the notion of hill-walking, let alone rock-climbing, as a leisure activity, regarding mountain landscapes as the proper abode of the divine, the dangerous and the demented. These days we have taken to the hills en masse; those of us who aren't scrambling up them, painting them or sitting gazing at them are likely to be watching movies or reading books about those who are. Macfarlane is a climber himself, but this is a sceptic's book, a witty, engaging trawl across cultural territory - science, literature, philosophy, anthropology - which the dozens of mountaineering histories and adventure yarns published every year have done little to explore. It won the Guardian first book award last year, and no wonder: if you hate mountain books, this is the mountain book for you. - Arminta Wallace
Rising '44: The Battle for Warsaw Norman Davies Pan, £9.99
In an absorbing, detailed account, Davies retraces the events that surrounded and included those fateful 63 days between August 1st and October 2nd, 1944, when Polish combatants fought in vain to liberate their capital from German occupation. A taut, horrific tale told within the claustrophobic political landscape of Allied pontification and obdurateness, Nazi and Soviet barbarity, and the ineffectiveness and misguidedness of the Polish Government-in-exile in London, who supplicated for resources and manpower at the great tables of Casablanca, Crimea, Quebec and Yalta. Overall, a disturbing exploration of a soul-destroying process that encourages a nation to rise from the heel of oppression, only to vacillate with obfuscation on the banks of political calculus, watching like playground generals for that same nation to flounder between the merciless teeth of opposing, manipulative ideologies. - Paul O'Doherty
Attention All Shipping: A Journey Around the Shipping Forecast Charlie Connelly Little, Brown, £12.99
Britannia may no longer rule the waves but Britons are still slaves to the sea. BBC Radio 4's Shipping Forecast has a cult following that extends beyond those at peril. Landlubbers across the Home Counties and beyond are mesmerised by south-westerly veering north-westerly five or six decreasing four, menaced by German Bight and mystified by location - where is Sole? Connelly writes in a cheeky chappie style befitting a Londoner with roots in the old Docklands. Aiming to recapture the spirit of his maritime ancestry he visits the bleak chunks of ocean which make up the forecast's sea areas. Most of his journey is on dry land resulting in a travelogue of quirky outposts from Utsire to Heligoland. Ireland made an impact; he claims to now understand "what it means to be a Corkman". But nothing matches the poetry available nightly at 00.48 on Longwave 198 kHz. Moderate with fog patches. - Michael Parsons
My Invented Country Isabel Allende Harper Perennial, £7.99
There can hardly be a better way to get a flavour of Chile than by reading this sensitive, subjective and selective yet loving memoir from Isabel Allende. With the measured assurance and style of a writer at the height of her powers, she leads us on a hugely enjoyable nostalgic exploration of Chile and Chileans. Here is a wealth of wonderful stories, many of which are related by reference to her own extended family, not least her uncle, Salvador Allende, whose democratically elected government was overthrown in a US-backed coup 1973, in which he was killed. Without that tragedy, however, it is unlikely that Isabel would have fled to Venezuela where she began the cathartic letter to her grandfather which grew into her great first novel, The House of the Spirits, and now this. - John Moran
The London Pigeon Wars Patrick Neate Penguin Books, £7.99
The battle of the birds - the Pigeon Front and the Surbs - is sparked by a squabble over the contents of a Trafalgar Square dustbin, and it explodes with the murder of the pigeon Brixton23 above a car-park. Londoners are perplexed by the mayhem, which forms the backdrop to a group of largely unlikeable people and their problems. These include two businesses (one failing, one fledgling), the remnants of a relationship, a planned bank robbery, and the question of just what the redoubtable Murray has been up to in the decade since his friends last saw him. The chapters in pigeons' English are so exhilarating as to make the humans' plot almost pedestrian, but the tales of friends and feathered foes conclude with a satisfying twist. - Joyce Hickey