Priscilla’s Spies by George A. Birmingham

Description

George A. Birmingham was the pen name of James Owen Hannay, an Irish clergyman who became one of the wittiest novelists of the age, and Priscilla’s Spies is him at his best: a comedy of youth, boats and national suspicion set in the summer of 1912 on the coast of Connaught.

Frank Mannix returns from Haileybury trailing glory — the catch that beat Uppingham, sixty not out, the taste in ties — and immediately sprains an ankle on the pier, to be rescued by his cousin Priscilla, fifteen, fearless and utterly unimpressed by his schoolboy crowns. Priscilla is determined that men are not going to have all the adventures, and since the stranger in Flanagan’s old boat appears to be rowing between the islands in a highly suspicious way, she decides he is a German spy and that she, of course, will catch him. The chase winds through Rosnacree, its gossipy quay and its patient islanders, and the banter between the two cousins is sharp enough to shave with — until the play-spying begins to look less playful than either expected.

Reasons to read it

• One of the great spirited heroines of the period, untamed by any convention.
• An affectionate, funny portrait of a West of Ireland village alive with boats and talk.
• The light-hearted pre-war tension that gives the comedy its edge.

About This DodaBooks Edition

The full text — 22 chapters — is reset with roomy leading, a one-tap contents page and typography that stays crisp on small screens as comfortably as on a desktop reader.