4180 The End of the Hunt, by Thomas Flanagan (read 23 June 2006) This is the third of novels dealing with Irish history, The Year of the French (read 28 June 1979) dealing with late 18th century Ireland and The Tenants of Time (read 9 June 2002) dealing with the 1860s. Flanagan is American-born but you'd never know that he was not Irish to the core. This volume is laid in the years from 1916 to 1924 and while fiction has prominent actual persons as characters. The flyleaf says "any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental" which is a lie since much is historically accurate. So one does not know where truth ends and fiction begins sometimes. I could not tell that any history was changed in the telling. The first part of the book I thought kind of pedestrian but the events of 1921 et seq. in Ireland make the last half of the book dramatic and attention-holding. ( )

Conclusion of Flanagan's Irish trilogy. Very good. ( )

The time of Mike Collins is given "a Flanagan" treatment of historical fiction. Also excellet. ( )