Braywatch

By: Ross O'Carroll-Kelly

Narrated by: Rory Nolan

Brought to you by Penguin

'If I've learned one thing,' the late, great Father Fehily used to say, 'it's that life, families and rugby balls don't always behave the way you want them to!'

Looking at my life, I'd have to say, the dude wasn't wrong.

My old man had been caught rigging a General Election. My old dear was about to become a seventy-year-old mother of six. And Honor was walking around in a yellow rain mac, telling everyone that the end of the world was coming.

It was enough to drive a man to the brink.

The only simple thing in my life was my new job as the Head Coach of Presentation College Bray - which is saying something given that I had to try to turn a collection of jokers, chokers and forty-a-day smokers into a team capable of winning the school's first Leinster Schools Senior Cup in nearly ninety years.

And while Father Fehily would have been spinning in his grave, I soon found myself falling in love - with the town I loathed so well.

(C) Ross O'Caroll-Kelly 2020 (P) Penguin Audio 2020

Critic reviews

Ross is a national institution ... wicked humour and sharp observation

Riotously funny ... Surrender to laugh out loud humour yet again

One of the funniest writers in the land

Extraordinarily accurate and outstandingly funny

Great Entertainment

I wish more of these books were available to listen to in the United States.

Proud 2B Bray - uplifting underdog Rugby tale

This was an upbeat and funny tale of how a fish-out-of-water (Ross) rugby coach elevates a no-hoper team (Pres Bray) to compete with the big boys of the Dublin private rugby schools. And he manages to do most of it despite himself.

I live near Bray so enjoyed the local knowledge and the few in-jokes. And Rory Nolan brings a wide variety of voices, weird personalities and accents to life.

You could argue that Ross O'Carroll-Kelly books are formulaic, but they still bubble with novelty and new ways for Ross to mess up, make a lucky escape, mess up again and somehow still come out on top - with the help of his wiser friends and enemies.