A THOUGHT WITHOUT COLLISION

An utterly distinctive voice in contemporary Irish literature Irish Times One of our most original writers Irish IndependentSummer 1923 Six year old Catherine Carolan grows restless on her parents farm It s already clear that her intellect will soon outgrow the two room schoolhouse across the fields But in post Civil War Ireland an education is not an easy thing for a girl to access and young Catherine is not the only one in her family who will come to tire of rural life Summer 1951 To ease him through his final days Dr Josef Alois calls for someone from his past Enter Catherine Carolan now an Oxford professor As Alois s mind and body falter Catherine must decide how far she will follow this man that she loves A novel in two strands A Thought without Collision is a beautiful meditation on how we construct our relationship to the world around us An original voice a writer who has come to recreate the world on his own terms Colm Tóibín An elegant rarity in contemporary fiction Cathy Sweeney