A breezy, amiable memoir, Anseo (Irish for 'Here') by Úna-Minh Kavanagh is the author's account of growing up in southwestern Ireland as the only child of a single mother, learning Irish from her beloved grandfather who was a cainteoir dúchais, and experiencing and pushing back against racism expressed by the goms who think that someone adopted from Vietnam can't "really" be Irish.

Kavanagh's love for the Gaeilge shines through here, but she perhaps hasn't yet lived enough life to fill a memoir. At times this felt padded. I would have liked for her to spend more time digging into issues of language, identity, and colonialism than listing out her undergraduate roommates and what music they'd danced to on their nights out. It would have made for a stronger book. (For example, why does she seem to swing back and forth between defining herself as a fluent/L1 speaker and mentioning teaching beginners' Irish-language classes, but then also talking a lot about her lack of vocabulary/confidence in her grammar? There's something there in terms of identity as a Gaeilgeoir/bilingual person to dig into, but Kavanagh never touches on it. (A separate, tangential confusion: how did her Irish instructor at DCU not know that breoite = tinn? I know that Caighdeán Oifigiúil speakers will generally only say the latter, but for a university-level instructor not to know they're synonyms felt kind of like hearing an Anglophone say that they'd never known some people call soda "pop."))

In terms of the level Anseo is pitched at, I'd say it would work best for teen readers, who'll find it accessible and engaging. ( )

This is a fantastic book that showcases ‘irishness’ at its very best! It’s the story of one woman’s love for her identity and country and how we should all embrace that! ( )