Book excerpt: From the author of City of Bohane and Dark Lies the Island, a debut collection that "could easily have been titled ‘These Are Little Masterpieces'" (The Irish Times) This award-winning story collection by Kevin Barry summons all the laughter, darkness, and intensity of contemporary Irish life. A pair of fast girls court trouble as they cool their heels on a slow night in a small town. Lonesome hillwalkers take to the high reaches in pursuit of a saving embrace. A bewildered man steps off a country bus in search of his identity—and a stiff drink. These stories, filled with a grand sense of life's absurdity, form a remarkably surefooted collection that reads like a modern-day Dubliners. Winner of the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, and a 2007 book of the year in the Irish Times, the Sunday Tribune, and Metro, There Are Little Kingdoms marks the stunning entrance of a writer who burst onto the literary scene fully formed.