Almost every human being yearns to love and be loved. Often this is given first by our family, and when it isn’t, the soul searches for affection in other places. This is the hardest road.

I learned a lot about Ireland – and the Irish – while reading this book. I learned that the priests are all perverts and sadistic controllers; their parishioners do their best to follow the example of the priests; the people are ignorant (and thus use myriad swear words instead of using real words); the men are either homosexual or they want to be, and if they aren’t either of those, they are still completely obsessed with sex with as many partners as possible, as are the other men. In fact, I learned that most Irish, male or female, gay or straight, are actually obsessed with sex in one way or another. Maybe this is also why the governments are completely corrupt and filled with people who would rather watch TV and fight with each other than figure out how to run the country – or so I learned. As Cyril grows older, he begins questioning why he doesn’t seem to have an interest in girls and seems to have an attraction to only boys. At the age of 7, he discovers after meeting a boy named Julian, that he loves him and eventually they become best friends into adulthood. Julian is attractive and always interested in new women, but Cyril won’t be accepted for who he is and must live in secret by hiding behind his true self due to his sexual identity. From that moment on, he continues to act as though he has an interest in women while keeping the truth a secret because it’s not accepted by anyone and can be flat-out dangerous if someone finds out. Being gay wasn’t accepted and people who were suspected to be gay were beaten up and called names like ‘nanny boys’ and ‘queers’. Cyril loved Julian from the moment they meet, but even his best friend won’t accept the truth when he finds out that he is gay and becomes very upset with him because he didn’t tell the truth from the beginning. Their story broke my heart into thousand little pieces! I was devastated when Cyril confessed his love to Julian!! Julian’s reaction was so bad; it was every nightmare come true, every doubt and every second of guilt centred on that one single moment. It was a hit right in the stomach and it hurt so, so much. T_T I mean there was a reason why Cyril never told him and instead of proving him wrong, Julian reacted exactly how Cyril expected him to. This is our biggest fear, to show our true self and to be rejected for it. For poor Cyril this nightmare became reality. I mean I understand Julian’s POV too, it was horrible that his best friend was about to ditch his sister right in front of the altar but damn if he just would have stopped for a little moment and thought things through. To force Cyril to marry Alice was the worst thing he could have done and he did it without hesitation. And then… after all those years, after everything that happened Julian saw him once again. In a hospital bed, having AIDS. Gosh, this was so damn sad. I mean after all the girls Julian was with this didn’t really come as a surprise… but still. It was heart-breaking nevertheless. They got a last chance to talk and to make their peace with each other and even though it made me cry like a little girl that moment was so important and necessary and … T_T I can’t even. I’m crying just thinking about it. When Cyril held Julian and told him to let go… *sobs uncontrollably* Despite all their differences, despite all the bad blood and anger between them, they were friends in the end and Julian died in the arms of Cyril. T_T There are numerous themes at play here: obsession vs. love; bigotry vs. openness; and cultural influences vs individual integrity. Instead of being heavy-handed in dealing with such lofty topics, John Boyne employs a steady undercurrent of humor that is disarming in its subtlety but often laugh aloud funny. The thread of the mother/son connection knits together the story as it weaves in and out of the narrative (Peggy A). A sweeping saga of one gay man's life over 70 years of Irish history, by the author of The Boy In the Striped Pajamas

Media Reviews

In The Heart's Invisible Furies, some coincidences are more successfully told than others. Occasionally, one feels the minor characters are better developed than Cyril himself who sometimes risks simply being a cypher for bigger events. But it doesn't really matter because, as a reader, you know you're in the hands of a writer who wants above all to entertain. Yet to me, the book was reminiscent of the storytelling of William Boyd combined with the hilarious satire of the early works of Evelyn Waugh — like Decline and Fall and Scoop.

There ensues a rites-of-passage story shadowing the chequered life of her son, whom she's forced to relinquish after giving birth to him in the most desperate of circumstances. The story begins with a teenage girl named Catherine who is pregnant and not accepted by her family or church any longer. It’s the 1940’s in Ireland and she’s exiled and expected to start a new life elsewhere, which she does. After her baby is born, she gives him up and he’s adopted by a couple named Charles and Maude Avery. They name him Cyril and he loves his adoptive parents very much, but he doesn’t receive the love he deserves from them and he’s consistently told, “You’re not a real Avery.” GREAT DISCUSSION BOOK .....BECAUSE YOU'LL miss this novel so much when it ends - you'll be excited to talk about it with other people! I can't wait!!! I thought, if I could make it funny, and still make the characters real, still make it moving and sad, well why not?”

Novelists often write about writing and Boyne has a bit of fun with the subject. Maude Avery, Cyril’s adoptive mother holds a dim view of her profession. “Do you enjoy being a writer, Mrs Avery?” asked Julian. I got a deeper experience about The Parliament of Ireland - The Dial Eiereann - TD Bankers - oppression- bigotry - discrimination - hostility towards gays - and hostility towards Ireland. With strange parental guidance and no emotional support to speak of, a sexually frustrated young Cyril resorts to the confessional, and (OMG) that does not go too well either. The writing is so effective here, I could almost feel the.....um fallout. Boyne’s enraged vision is his great strength in The Heart’s Invisible Furies. The appalling comedy of Cyril’s childhood and youth, the vigour, the mess, the stir and life and horror of it all form the heart of a substantial achievement.

It is hard to tell what goes on in those “gap times” in his life (the book is written in seven-year intervals through his life span), but he does seem to start pulling himself together into an understanding that he is a being who is human and that maybe he’s not the only person in the world (or even Ireland) who has been challenged with hard choices and decisions to make in their lives.

Beyond the Book

I had a little bit of a hard time connecting with the characters at first even though they are unique, interesting, and unforgettable. That seems so ungrateful. The world will not stop turning if you don’t write a book. If you don’t like it, don’t do it. Boyne is attempting something rather epic here, letting one man's story stand in for the history of homosexuality over the last five decades and in several locations. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. He also strives to bring the characters full circle; Cyril unknowingly keeps running across his birth mother, and the figure of Julian, his first crush, makes several reappearances. An interesting effort, if not always successful (Deborah M). Although I enjoyed the read, many themes were repetitive and too long. I think the novel would have been improved with tighter editing (Viqui G).

The foreshadowing is great. There are lines like this one: “…and in that moment I made the biggest mistake of my life.” I love it when I’m set up like that. Of course I’m dying to find out what he means. Instantly and completely. I’m panting. I was 16 in 1987. I can remember one particular day coming home from school and a news report said Aids was like the plague and was going to kill everybody.

BookBrowse Review

Cyril's birth, in a dingy flat on Dublin's Chatham Street, is married by extreme violence and prejudice. It wasn't aimed at his mother, but at her flatmate, a young man she met on the bus to Dublin. It is heartbreaking. Of course there’s a fine line between authenticity and exaggeration but Boyne made sure never to cross it. He balanced along it for the duration of the entire book and no matter how absurd some situations seemed to be, no matter how extreme some people’s opinion were, they were never far-fetched. There DO exist Mary-Margarets, Julians and Charles all over this world and it’s realistic to assume that they might eventually cross your way. ;-) There are some moments of real bleakness and sadness that literally brought me to tears. However, this isn’t a depressing novel. It’s full of heart and made me laugh out loud on several occasions.