New Releases by Paul Murray

The bestselling and critically acclaimed novel from Paul Murray, Skippy Dies, shortlisted for the 2010 Costa Book Awards, longlisted for the 2010 Booker Prize, and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Why does Skippy, a fourteen-year-old boy at Dublin''s venerable Seabrook College, end up dead on the floor of the local doughnut shop? Could it have something to do with his friend Ruprecht Van Doren, an overweight genius who is determined to open a portal into a parallel universe using ten-dimensional string theory? Could it involve Carl, the teenage drug dealer and borderline psychotic who is Skippy''s rival in love? Or could "the Automator"—the ruthless, smooth-talking headmaster intent on modernizing the school—have something to hide? Why Skippy dies and what happens next is the subject of this dazzling and uproarious novel, unraveling a mystery that links the boys of Seabrook College to their parents and teachers in ways nobody could have imagined. With a cast of characters that ranges from hip-hop-loving fourteen-year-old Eoin "MC Sexecutioner" Flynn to basketball playing midget Philip Kilfether, packed with questions and answers on everything from Ritalin, to M-theory, to bungee jumping, to the hidden meaning of the poetry of Robert Frost, Skippy Dies is a heartfelt, hilarious portrait of the pain, joy, and occasional beauty of adolescence, and a tragic depiction of a world always happy to sacrifice its weakest members. As the twenty-first century enters its teenage years, this is a breathtaking novel from a young writer who will come to define his generation.

Why does Skippy, a fourteen-year-old boy at Dublin''s venerable Seabrook College, end up dead on the floor of the local doughnut shop? Could it have something to do with his friend Ruprecht Van Doren, an overweight genius who is determined to open a portal into a parallel universe using ten-dimensional string theory? Could it involve Carl, the teenage drug dealer and borderline psychotic who is Skippy''s rival in love? Or could "the Automator"--the ruthless, smooth-talking headmaster intent on modernizing the school--have something to hide? Why Skippy dies and what happens next is the subject of this dazzling and uproarious novel, unraveling a mystery that links the boys of Seabrook College to their parents and teachers in ways nobody could have imagined. With a cast of characters that ranges from hip-hop-loving fourteen-year-old Eoin "MC Sexecutioner" Flynn to basketball-playing midget Philip Kilfether, packed with questions and answers on everything from Ritalin, to M-theory, to bungee jumping, to the hidden meaning of the poetry of Robert Frost, Skippy Dies is a heartfelt, hilarious portrait of the pain, joy, and occasional beauty of adolescence, and a tragic depiction of a world always happy to sacrifice its weakest members. As the twenty-first century enters its teenage years, this is a breathtaking novel, in this striking three-volume boxed set, from a young writer who will come to define his generation.

An entirely fresh approach to the Our Father, Jesus''s own prayer, through the eyes of one of the greatest saints, Thomas Aquinas. Never before have the most important reflections by Aquinas on the Lord''s Prayer been drawn together and considered in a single book. Here, Aquinas comes alive not merely as a profound speculative theologian but also as an impressive master and guide of the spiritual and moral life. And he also comes across, on occasion, as a teacher capable of saying the unexpected, openly confessing, for example, "...it is hardly possible to say a single Our Father without our minds wandering off to other things." The style of Aquinas is, for the most part, plain and expository, but evident on every page is the serene, unmistakable mark of wisdom, Aquinas''s own, and that of the great tradition. Those readers who, in the past, have found the study of Aquinas especially daunting, will be grateful to the Dominican Paul Murray for the freshness and clarity he brings to his task. Praying with Confidence: Aquinas on the Lord''s Prayer is both a stimulating scholarly study and an ideal introduction for the general reader.

"First published in the UK as Door into the sacred: a meditation on the Hail Mary by Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd."--T.p. verso.

Vastly entertaining and outright hilarious, Paul Murray’s debut heralds the arrival of a major new Irish talent. His protagonist is endearing and wildly witty–part P. G. Wodehouse’s Bertie Wooster, with a cantankerous dash of A Confederacy of Dunces’ Ignatius J. Reilly thrown in. With its rollicking plot and colorful characters, An Evening of Long Goodbyes is a delightful and erudite comedy of epic proportions. Charles Hythloday observes the world from the comfortable confines of Amaurot, his family estate, and doesn’t much care for what he sees. He prefers the black-and-white sanctum of classic cinema–especially anything starring the beautiful Gene Tierney–to the roiling and rumbling of twenty-first-century Dublin. At twenty-four, Charles aims to resurrect the lost lifestyle of the aristocratic country gentleman–contemplative walks, an ever-replenished drink, and afternoons filled with canapés as prepared by the Bosnian housekeeper, Mrs. P. But Charles’s cozy existence is about to face a serious shake-up. His sister, Bel, an aspiring actress and hopeless romantic, has brought to Amaurot her most recent–and to Charles’s mind, most ill-advised–boyfriend. Frank is hulking and round, and resembles nothing so much as a large dresser, probably a Swedish one. He bets on greyhounds and talks endlessly of brawls and pubs in an accent that brings tears to Charles’s eyes. And, most suspiciously, his entrance into the Hythlodays’ lives just happens to coincide with the disappearance of an ever-increasing number of household antiques and baubles. Soon, Charles and Bel discover that missing heirlooms are the least of their worries; they are simply not as rich as they have always believed. With the family fortune teetering in the balance, Charles must do something he swore he would never do: get a job. Booted into the mean streets of Dublin, he is as unprepared for real life as Frank would be for a cotillion. And it turns out that real life is a tad unprepared for Charles, as well.

This rigorous explanation of plasmas is relevant to diverse plasma applications. More thorough than previous texts, it exploits new powerful techniques to develop deeper insights into plasma behavior. Written for advanced students, it explores a host of essential and advanced topics while emphasizing the fundamentals that apply to all plasmas.

It is one of the great ironies of literary history that the author of arguably the world''s bestselling work of fiction remains little known. This book seeks to redress the balance and to articulate a new vision of Bram Stoker, relating the creator to his most famous creation. Paul Murray has examined important primary sources, such as Stoker''s working notes for DRACULA, and his extensive correspondence, which shed an entirely new light on Stoker''s life. He places Stoker in the context of Victorian Ireland and the literary and theatrical circles in which he moved. Bram Stoker was immersed in the Dublin literary scene and was involved with the great theatrical, literary and artistic figures of the day such as Sarah Bernhardt, Ellen Terry, Oscar Wilde, Mark Twain, Tennyson and Whistler. His most important relationship, however, was with Henry Irving, with whom he ran the Lyceum Theatre in London. And, as his greatest achievement, DRACULA, Stoker''s enduring work of horror, is placed at the core of this book.This remarkable new biography places Bran Stoker centre-stage in a tradition of Irish horror writing which extends back to authors such as Charles Maturin and Sheridan Le Fanu and which also looks forward to writers such as Neil Jordan and Anne Rice.

A look at the meaning, and the humor, of the Book of Jonah.

Spheromaks are easily formed, self-organized magnetized plasma configurations that have intrigued plasma physicists for over two decades. Sometimes called magnetic vortices, magnetic smoke rings, or plasmoids, spheromaks first attracted attention as a possible controlled thermonuclear plasma confinement scheme, but are now known to have many other applications. This book begins with a review of the basic concepts of magnetohydrodynamics and toroidal magnetic configurations, then provides a detailed exposition of the 3D topological concepts underlying spheromak physics, namely magnetic helicity, Taylor relaxation, force-free equilibria, and tilt stability. It then examines spheromak formation techniques, driven and isolated configurations, dynamo concepts, practical experimental issues, diagnostics, and a number of applications. The book concludes by showing how spheromak ideas are closely related to the physics of solar prominences and interplanetary magnetic clouds.

The author finds that these committees are predominantly influenced by members of research institutions and by the researchers themselves. Yet researchers, and their institutions, stand to gain considerable benefits from the experiments they conduct. Dr McNeill argues that committees of review, as they are presently constituted, cannot be relied on to ensure an equitable balance between the interests of researchers and the interests of the human subjects experimented on. He proposes a radically different rationale and model for committee review.

Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) has long been marginalised as a failed Victorian Romantic whose writings on Japan were poetic but inconsequential; as a person, he emerges as a one-dimensional neurotic. In this new study, based on a wealth of hitherto unpublished sources, as well as a fresh reading of Hearn''s writings, Paul Murray reveals a multi-faceted character of considerable depth, intelligence and literary skill. This is a book, therefore, that will appeal on many levels. The story of Hearn''s life makes fascinating reading; his fantastic journey took him from conception outside marriage on a Greek island to a protected upbringing in Dublin; from a Gothic education in England to Cincinnati in the United States where, as Paddy Hearn, he established himself as a journalist of the macabre par excellence. In New Orleans, in the 1860s, he transformed himself into Lafcadio Hearn, litterateur and a man of the South. Finally after two years in the West Indies, he spent the last fourteen years of his life in Japan - arriving in ''the land of the gods'' in the spring of 1890. Although it was always to be an ambiguous relationship with his adopted country, Hearn gave to the world some of the most valuable and enduring insights into Japanese society and culture that continue to stand the test of time. For students of the Anglo-Irish tradition, a little explored strand of Hearn''s heritage, this book is also essential reading, providing substantial insights into Hearn''s mastery of the literary horror genre. Equally, students of Japan will want to understand, for the first time, the make-up and motivation of one of its greatest ever Western interpreters.

''At last, we have a study that tackles these questions, and does so with a wealth of learning, a poet''s sensibility and a thorough theological literacy...Murray has given us a superb study.'' Rowan Williams, Doctrine and Life ''His point of view is always that of someone practised in meditation, and his book is in consequence one of the half-dozen really valuable guides to Eliot''s poetry.'' Stephen Medcalf, Times Literary Supplement The story of the composition of Four Quartets, in relation to mysticism, constitutes one of the most interesting pages in modern literary history. T.S. Eliot drew his inspiration not only from the literature of orthodox Christian mysticism and from a variety of Hindu and Buddhist sources, but also from the literature of the occult, and from several unexpected and so far unacknowledged sources such as the ''mystical'' symbolism of Shakespeare''s later plays and the visionary poetry of Rudyard Kipling. But the primary concern of this study is not with sources as such, nor with an area somewhere behind the work, but rather with that point in Four Quartets where Eliot''s own mystical attitude and his poetry unite and intersect.

Pirates et membres du Parlement, marchands et ménestrels, nobles et notaires, grandes dames enamourées, roturiers ambitieux, religieuses boudeuses : voilà les personnages de cette fresque de la seconde moitié du XVe siècle anglais, dans laquelle, avec son remarquable talent d''écriture, P.M. Kendall démontre que, contrairement à ce que l''on a longtemps soutenu, la guerre des Deux-Roses n''a pas été un plongeon dans l''anarchie mais bien une remontée des profondeurs de l''anarchie. L''histoire de l''Angleterre moderne ne commence pas avec les Tudors mais avec les York, en cette période d''équilibre et de prospérité qui suit les soulèvements de la fin du XIVe siècle et précède les temps difficiles et les rancoeurs du début du XVIe. Idées, attitudes, craintes, aspirations, la " vieille danse " de l''amour et de la mort, le costume, la tenue de la maison, en ville et à la campagne, les affaires : autant de sujets traités à partir de sources contemporaines, récits de voyageurs, correspondances, rapports des diplomates français et italiens, comptes privés et publics, testaments, etc., qui restituent la couleur et le parfum de l''époque.