A wonderful read and strong candidate for a top ten of 2025. The Thing About December was recommended (rightly) to me by Helen Evans, for it is a masterpiece exercise in understanding the importance of dialogue. The novel, set in a small Irish community over the course of a year (hence its title), captures the misfortunes of its narrator, Johnsey Cunnliffe. The novel is written in third person but told only from the perspective of Johnsey. It captures the pain of loss (of one's parents, but also one's dignity), but also the small-minded nature of people with big or dominant personalities. Surviving in a changing world, which he fails fully to comprehend, is Johnsey's challenge. Author Donal Ryan also captures well the hubris of the Celtic Tiger boom, how (the promise of) money trumps previous ways of doing business. The pain of the tragedies Johnsey encounters is both brutal and visceral. The reader cannot help but feel it, but such is the quality of Ryan's writing, you are not left to wallow in it or to sentimentalise. Bigger forces are at work. Words, how they are spoken and what they mean, attain significant value here. Few are wasted. To get into the Irish vernacular and understand a way of life, read this. 10/10.
By Donal Ryan