Children of Croke Park

Originally from Killavullen, Co Cork, Michael Foley has written Kings of September, winner of the 2007 BoyleSports Irish Sportsbook of the year. He also ghostwrote Harte: Presence Is the Only Thing, the autobiography of Tyrone gaelic football manager Mickey Harte, shortlisted for the 2009 William Hill Irish Sportsbook of the Year.Winner of the GAA’s McNamee Award in 2008 and shortlisted for Sports Journalist of the Year in 2003, he is acting sports editor and GAA correspondent for the Irish edition of the Sunday Times. This is his third book. He currently resides in Macroom, Co Cork.

It has been a phenomenal year for younger sports readers, one to make older ones seethe with envy that this breadth and quality just wasn’t around in our day. We’ll start with The Children of Croke Park by Michael Foley, the latest offering in the author’s one-man mission to preserve the memories of those who died in Croke Park on Bloody Sunday in 1920. These are the stories of Jerome O’Leary, William Robinson and John William Scott - the three youngest people killed that day - written in the style of a novel while using all the established facts from archives and his own research to carry the tale along. Foley’s quest to keep Bloody Sunday a living, breathing thing in 21st century Ireland is one of the great modern feats of public service journalism and we are all the better as a nation for it