'My mother looked up at the stars. There were plenty of them up there. She lifted her hand. It swayed as she chose one. Her finger pointed. '- There's my little Henry up there. Look it. 'I looked, her other little Henry sitting beside her on the step. I looked up and hated him. She held me but she looked up at her twinkling boy.'

Born in the slums of Dublin in 1901, his father a one-legged whorehouse bouncer and settle of scores, Henry Smart has to grow up fast. By the time he can walk he's out robbing, begging, often cold, always hungry, but a prince of the streets. At fourteen, already six foot two, Henry's in the General Post Office on Easter Monday 1916, a soldier in the Irish Citizen Army, fighting for freedom. A year later he's ready to die for Ireland again, a rebel, a Fenian and soon, a killer. With his father's wooden leg as his weapon, Henry become a republican legend - one of Michael Collins' boys, a cop killer, an assassin on a stolen bike.

An historical novel until none before it, this book marks a new chapter in Roddy Doyle's writing. It is a vastly more ambitious book than any he has written before, the first in a projected trilogy which is already being hailed as a 'masterpiece' in the Irish press. A subversive look behind the legends of Irish republicanism, at its centre a passionate love story, this is ultimately a triumph work of fiction.