Jonathan Bardon News Today

Books in brief: New works by Philip Freeman, Moshik Temkin and John Quinn

Belfast has a healthy literary scene, closely connected with Queen’s University, whose creative writing tutors include poets Gail McConnell and Stephen Sexton

Whether youre buying for somebody else or treating yourself, books are a great gift option. Here are tips for some of the best from 2023 

Victor Blease, a highly innovative former chief of the Housing Executive (HE) and eldest son of notable trade union leader the late Lord Billy Blease, has died in the Ulster Hospital.

Brian Feeney –‘New study shows financial benefits of a united Ireland’ (June 1) – claims that according to economists, professors Seamus McGuinness and Adele Bergin of the Economic and Social Research Institute, the biggest long-term unification costs might be in bringing what unionists claim is the north’s ‘world-class’ education system up to modern standards.

Starting out as a small but energetic and, above all, committed group of parents in County Down in the early 1970s, All Children Together (ACT) believed that, as long as children continued to be educated separately, there was little hope of healing the festering wounds in a society blighted by bitter division. This is the story of the pioneers of the integrated education movement in Northern Ireland. The book chronicles how ACT faced powerful establishment resistance - both clerical and lay - t...