The Irish Answer to James Herriot

The Irish Country Doctor Series Continues

Patrick Taylor is the Irish equivalent of James Herriott, the pen name of the British Veterinarian, who brought to life the unique and quirky humor of a veterinarian in rural England, through his All Creatures Great and Small series.  I continued my reading of this series this past summer.  Pardon my late entries.  Be assured I have stopped 

Taylor has done the same thing with his Irish Country Doctor series. Taylor, a medical doctor himself, places his young medical doctor, fresh out of Queen's College Medical School in Belfast, in a small country practice in the fictional village of Ballybucklebo, located just southeast of Belfast, near the coast.

Taylor continues his tremendous storytelling by focusing on Dr. O'Reilly's unflappable housekeeper, Kinky Kincaid, in An Irish Country Girl, the fourth segment in his series.  After reading his first novel in the series, An Irish Country Doctor, I knew I was hooked. This book series is like watching the addictive BBC series on PBS, Downton Abbey.       

The 5th in the series is An Irish Country Courtship.  At this point in the story, you are not quite sure whose courtship is going to be the focus, because both Dr. Fingal O'Flaherty and the young Dr. Barry Laverty have started relationships. Dr. Laverty is trying to recover from a breakup with his love, Patricia, who basically told him life as a general practitioner's wife in a backwater town is not for her. And Barry is starting to question whether he is cut out for life as a GP in a small village. So has Barry found a new love or has he managed to rekindle the embers from his relationship with Patricia.  

Don't forget Fingal!  He has rekindled a relationship with his first love Kitty O'Halloran, who he met years ago as young medical student.   

If you haven't tried this series, you need to pick up the first novel in the set, An Irish Country Doctor. You will fall in love with Taylor's cast of quirky characters and the trials and tribulations in the life of a GP in a small Northern Ireland village.