The fire is lit. The chairs are pulled in. Someone says, ‘Well – who has a story?’

When Jane Gormley threw open her family’s straw shed one October night and invited strangers in to tell stories, she thought she was organising a party. She was reviving something much older: the Irish gift for gathering, listening and being together – face to face, no phones, no hurry.

A Seat by the Fire follows CRAICLY from that candlelit shed to the Púca Festival, from Merry’s Bar in Dungarvan through organic farms, walled gardens and village shops to the grand dining rooms of Ballyvolane House and Stradbally Hall – collecting true stories along the way from farmers, bakers, butter champions, psychic mediums and one very reluctant Belfast best-man. Part memoir, part manifesto, it is a book about the oldest remedy for loneliness this country possesses: each other.

Warm, funny and quietly radical, it arrives as Ireland rediscovers its most enduring tradition – the seanchaí is returning. And it ends with Your Story Party Kit, so the next seat by the fire can be yours.

Illustrated with photographs from CRAICLY gatherings around the country.