PHOTOGRAPHY:STILL LOOKING FOR those tricky last-minute gifts? Look no further than your nearest bookshop. Irish publishers have excelled themselves this year, with a plethora of handsomely illustrated books gracing the shelves.
Many have been reviewed in these pages, of course, but if you’re planning a last-minute Christmas Eve dash, or if you’ve received a gift token and want to treat yourself to something a bit special, here are a few suggestions.
Our main photograph comes from Ordnance Survey Ireland's delightful The Hidden Park, a photographic record of the people – and animals – who inhabit the 700 hectares of the Phoenix Park. The images were made on the longest day of the year, June 21st. There are images from Dublin Zoo, Áras an Uachtaráin and Phoenix Park Special School, which caters for children with emotional and behavioural difficulties. The Hidden Parkcosts €19.99, and all proceeds go to the school and to the Society of St Vincent de Paul.
If you'd prefer something understated in black and white, how about an elegant volume of architectural images in Maurice Craig: Photographs, complete with captions in his inimitable, wry style (the Lilliput Press, €25), or Amelia Stein's sumptuous shots in The Palm House, taken at the National Botanic Gardens, in Dublin (the Lilliput Press, €40)?
Sports fans will enjoy Places We Play, by Mike Cronin and Roisín Higgins (the Collins Press, €24.99). Adventure buffs should relish Karen Farrington and Nick Constable's Mayday! Mayday!, a history of the Irish coastal rescue (Collins, €21.99). If you prefer poetry, there's Island of Shadow, a selection of Irish poems and paintings edited by Brian Lalor (Gill Macmillan, €14.99).
Naturalists are spoiled for choice, with a plethora of gorgeous books to choose from. Three of the best are Zoe Devlin's magnificent, highly personal Wildflowers of Ireland(Collins, €29.99), Donal Magner's magisterial survey of Irish woodland, Stopping by Woods,which has detailed directions for walks in every stretch of woodland in the country (Lilliput, €25), and Kieran Hickey's deliciously informative Wolves in Ireland(Four Courts Press, €29.95).
Finally, even the person who has everything would have to be charmed by the capital cabinet of curiosities that is Catriona Crowe's Dublin 1911(Royal Irish Academy, €20). Happy hunting.
