Bad Blood

A Walk Along the Irish Border

Colm Tóibín

$24.99

Paperback

Forthcoming
Pre-Order now

QTY:

English

Picador
15 July 2025

Social groups; Travel & holiday; Travel writing

Series: Picador Collection

Follow Colm Tóibín's lone religious pilgrimage along the Irish border during the tumultuous summer of 1987.

In the summer after the Anglo-Irish Agreement, when tension was high in Northern Ireland, Colm Tóibín walked along the border from Derry to Newry. Bad Blood is a stark and evocative account of this journey through fear and hatred, and a report on ordinary life and the legacy of history in a bleak and desolate landscape.

Tóibín describes the rituals - the marches, the funerals, the demonstrations - observed by both communities along the border, and listens to the stories which haunt both sides. With sympathy and insight Bad Blood captures the intimacy of life along one of the most contested strips of land in Western Europe.

Now part of the Picador Collection, a series showcasing the very best of modern literature.

By: Colm Tóibín
Imprint: Picador
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 198mm, Width: 131mm, Spine: 14mm
Weight: 148g
ISBN: 9781035054862
ISBN 10: 1035054868
Series: Picador Collection
Pages: 208
Publication Date: 15 July 2025
Recommended Age: From 18 years
Audience: General/trade , College/higher education , Professional and scholarly , ELT Advanced , Primary
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

Author Website: https://www.facebook.com/ColmToibinAuthor

Colm Tóibín was born in Ireland in 1955. He is the author of eleven novels, including The Master, Brooklyn, and The Magician, and two collections of stories. He has been three times shortlisted for the Booker Prize. In 2021, he was awarded the David Cohen Prize for Literature. Tóibín was appointed the Laureate for Irish Fiction 2022-2024.

Reviews for Bad Blood: A Walk Along the Irish Border

Tóibín writes prose of a heart-breaking beauty. * Daily Telegraph * Tóibín has the narrative poise of Brian Moore and the patient eye for domestic detail of John McGahern, but he is very much his own man. * Observer * High-class reportage . . . Tóibín was conscientious about talking to real people, not just “names” with a good line in TV chat, and went to see and hear and sense things at a local, grassroots level. * Irish Times *