num_pages: 656
description: Set during the year preceding the Easter Uprising of 1916 -- Ireland's brave but fractured revolt against British rule -- At Swim, Two Boys is a tender, tragic love story and a brilliant depiction of people caught in the tide of history. Powerful and artful, and ten years in the writing, it is a masterwork from Jamie O'Neill.Jim Mack is a naïve young scholar and the son of a foolish, aspiring shopkeeper. Doyler Doyle is the rough-diamond son -- revolutionary and blasphemous -- of Mr. Mack's old army pal. Out at the Forty Foot, that great jut of rock where gentlemen bathe in the nude, the two boys make a pact: Doyler will teach Jim to swim, and in a year, on Easter of 1916, they will swim to the distant beacon of Muglins Rock and claim that island for themselves. All the while Mr. Mack, who has grand plans for a corner shop empire, remains unaware of the depth of the boys' burgeoning friendship and of the changing landscape of a nation.
language: English
title: At Swim, Two Boys
titlecomplete: At Swim, Two Boys
genres: M M Romance, Ireland, Historical Fiction, Historical, LGBT, Irish Literature, Gay, Queer, Romance, Fiction
ratings_count: 9137
places: Ireland
awards: awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Stonewall Book Award
category: Literature, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Ferro-Grumley Award
category: Gay Fiction, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Lambda Literary Award
category: Gay Fiction, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Dublin Literary Award
publisher: Scribner