Autobiographical fiction

[CP James]

Just came across Some Lessons in Gaelic by McCawley Grange. Anyone read it? Set in 1950s southern Ireland, not a native place for Gilla Christe, its eleven-year-old English hero. It's a rites-of-passage tale charting Gilla's childhood to adolescence, in which, due to financial misfortune, he and his family have been transplanted to rural Ireland. We share his minor triumphs. We share his lesser successes with unsympathetic country boys. We sigh for ourselves when we watch his awkward interaction with the adult world. Girls are another species, and because unobtainable (to him) frustrate rather than satisfy his first sexual cravings. Much of this goes on under the watchful eyes of the Christian Brothers, who at times exhibit a matter-of-fact brutality, at others sympathy and understanding. It's a well-plotted novel, with dark undertones and memorably drawn characters, and is told with candour, humour and a genuine sense of humanity. Am looking for other books by this author.