The Fall of Ireland

An intimate human study and subtle portrait of a country in flux from New Island author Dermot Bolger.

While a floundering Irish government clings to its illusion of power as an international troika waits in the wings, Martin, a mid-ranking civil servant, finds himself alone in a Beijing hotel: a superfluous accessory in a delegation accompanying a Minister to China.

A cat-and-mouse encounter with a Chinese masseuse draws Martin into a world beyond his experience, forcing him to confront the gap between the chameleon face of someone at work and the reality when everything is stripped bare, with nowhere left to hide from the anxieties, longings and contradictions in his head.

The Fall of Ireland is a subtle meditation on the thin line between illusion and actuality: a study of a homesick man in the gilded cage of a luxury hotel, trying to unravel which elements of his life are real and which are subconscious deceptions.