Walking with Ghosts: A Memoir

When award-winning actor, producer, and international icon Gabriel Byrne was a young boy, his grandmother brought him to the cinema for the first time. There, Byrne fell in love with the transporting power of the big screen. Growing up in 1950s and 60s Dublin within a family of eight, Byrne's formative childhood years were both carefree and challenging, spent between home, the church, school, and the streets of his ever-changing city where he observed that some of the greatest actors and entertainers could be found in the lives of those around him. In captivating, funny, and sensual prose that brings to life the myriad voices of his youth, Byrne recounts his first formative 12 years - morning routines with his father, a barrel-maker at the Guinness factory; his debut role in a nativity play; his relationship with his dynamic mother; and his years at a seminary where he studied to be a priest. Interspersed throughout this engrossing childhood story we see Byrne's ascent to global stardom, from his days acting in amateur drama groups in London, to his first big role opposite Richard Burton, his arrival at the Cannes stage for his breakout hit movie, The Usual Suspects, to the HBO show In Treatment for which he won a Golden Globe. Combining the cinematic power of Fellini's Amarcord with the poignance of John McGahern's writing, Walking with Ghosts is both a moving exploration of the pathos in what it means to be famous and a singular account of Irish boyhood. Read more