When I was in elementary and high school, the arrival of Summer meant vacation...and a list of books to read. Thanks to my sister and others, that's the kind of Summer I'm going to have! For my birthday she gave me two Irish History books. I've already made a good dent in "Paddy's Lament", which given horrific detail to the British inspired and extended Potato Famine in 1846-47. Fully a quarter of the Irish population died, many of starvation, others of related diseases, while all of the non-potato crops grown in Ireland were required to be shipped across the channel to England. It is teaching me the festering source of "The Troubles" that for so long disrupted Irish life. Thomas Gallagher's book makes me wonder why there were no genocide trials against England, and proud to hold dual-citizenship in honor of my ancestors who somehow survived.
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