Colum McCann cannot write a stodgy paragraph and his latest offering, “Everything in this Country Must,” showcases his subtle, freighted prose. The author is a master at revealing without explicating, and here, over the course of a novella and short story, he portrays aspects of the Irish Troubles with sensitivity and grace. In the title novella, a teenage girl becomes enmeshed in the dramatic rescue of her Catholic father’s horse by boisterous, unthinking British solders. The two short stories also feature teenagers, one in exile with his mother while an uncle endures a hunger strike, the other helping his mother build poles for a Republican protest march while his crippled father sleeps. To my mind, the author is better suited to novels, as these shorter works cover little narrative ground and can underwhelm, but as always, the pleasure is in the lyricism.
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