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Rooted in Ireland’s history of internal violence, an inescapable brutality that drags like a shadow for natives and exiles alike, the ‘war of Ireland’ ensues in Seamus Scanlon’s short story collection, As Close As You’ll Ever Be. From Dublin to New York, Scanlon’s stories cover the vicious exploits of boy soldiers and IRA initiations, a son returning home to help his mother, a man mourning the boyhood loss of a cousin, or a childhood memory of first flight and escape. Operating under different circumstances of violence and crime, the characters are propelled in a ruthless conflagration between the binds of heritage and the burden of remembrance.