War between friends

Between Two Hells: The Irish Civil War by Diarmaid Ferriter Profile Books, 336 pages, £20

Since 2012, Ireland has been commemorating a decade of centenaries, starting with the Third Home Rule Bill in April 1912 and the mass signing of the Ulster Covenant in September 1912, and ending with the foundation of the Irish Free State in 1922-23. The high point so far has been the centenary parade marking the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin, attended by hundreds of thousands of people. Dublin was abuzz, and a BBC reporter at the event described “an Ireland at ease with its past”. The event’s military trappings were, if anything, ironic; they featured military vehicles from another era and a fly-past by six single-engine