WHAT is there left to say that is new about politics in Ireland over the past 240 years? If the question refers to recent events, there is a great deal to reveal. That said, there are no revelations here. In what reads like a series of lectures, admittedly informed ones, this is at best an introduction to the political history of the country. For example, novices to the subject may be surprised to read that before 1793 the Catholic majority were not just barred from voting but were excluded from parliament. Contemporary Ireland is covered by sympathetic pen pictures of unsympathetic people. 'The Bert' is profiled but not his tangled finances. Enda Kenny and Pat Rabbitte are introduced but there is no mention of how the Mayomen kept their heads down when fellow Mayomen were jailed during the Corrib gas field demonstrations. Informative but soft-focused.

Inside
By Kenneth J Harvey Vintage, �8.00, 282pps

HARVEY'S latest novel has everything a thriller buff could ask for. A man is banged away in the slammer for 14 years for murdering a woman. He is pardoned, the case is overturned. Compensation of $1m awaits, as does his wife . . . who waits to get her hands on the compo. The setting is the east coast of Canada, biting cold, about as cold as his missus. He has a daughter married to a thug and what he wants is to get his daughter and his granddaughter away from her bonehead husband and his destructive influence. But a series of entanglements baulk him. The writing is spirited with rapid-fire dialogue. It's an original look at the environments that stifle initiative and the institutions created to confine misfits.

Bruce Lee and Me A Martial Arts Adventure
By Brian Preston Atlantic Books, 13.40, 304pps

PRESTON'S recent book, Pot Planet: Adventures in Global Marijuana Culture, had the cops calling around at all hours. Inspirational publicity stunt; great media coverage. This time, we learn, his publishers provided the inspiration. Preston, by his own admission, is a "spineless wuss", yet he goes for the idea of learning to "eat bitter", ie learning the hard work and discipline of kung fu.

Millions are in thrall to the spectacle of martial arts, we are told. At a time when the world is becoming more violent with each passing day, you'd wonder why the west is in thrall to unarmed combat. Are devotees lacking self-esteem, insecure, selfabsorbed, a combination of all three? Does it solely attract the "wusses" of the world?

No Turning Back
By Joanne Lees Hodder, �7.00, 317pps

WHEN you are accused of a wrongdoing and remain tight-lipped, you inevitably attract the curious. When the wrongdoing is murder and the curious ones are the press, you are heading into stormy weather. One night in 2004, Joanne Lees and her boyfriend Peter were attacked in the Australian outback. She scrambled to safety and escaped into the bush. Peter was murdered, presumably because the body was never found. While she is recovering from that, she becomes the chief suspect, the media's focus, while the focus on the real murderer evaporated. Common enough scenario. It is not "unique", as the press release claims. In time, the real murderer is convicted. In fairness to the sceptics, her coolness and her unconvincing vagueness during questioning didn't help.

The Tartar Steppe
By Dino Buzzati Canongate, �8.00, 265pps

IN Buzzati's timeless classic, significantly written in 1938 with the world on the cusp of another war, young Giovanni is in danger of growing up. His hopes will be shattered, his dreams and ambitions will come to naught. Giovanni is the product of a dull military academy where tedium reigns. When he is considered officer quality, he gets his first posting to Fort Bastiani . . . "the beginning of his real life". In this he is greatly mistaken. The tedium of the academy is replaced by the inertia of the fort. Nothing happens at the fort and nothing significant happens for the rest of Giovanni's life. Classic and as bleak as the Steppes themselves.