The Collins Press imprint: 150 books

With some of Ireland’s most beautiful and untamed scenery, 400km of rugged coastline and enticingly peaceful roads, what better way to explore County Kerry than by bike? These scenic cycles will guide you along popular routes and bring you to hidden gems. In a county famous for its climbs, some...

DIrish construction workers in post-war Britain are celebrated in song and story. Donall MacAmhlaigh kept a diary as he worked the sites, danced in the Irish halls, drank in Irish pubs and lived the life of the roving Irish navvy. Work was hard, dirty and dangerous, followed by pints in the Admiral...

Hillwalking is one of Ireland’s most popular leisure activities today. Rock climbing has developed to a level of technical excellence with crags in almost every county and numerous indoor climbing walls. Irish mountaineers have completed winter ascents in the Alps, scaled the highest Himalayan peaks...

K2 is one of the world’s most difficult and unpredictable mountains. At 8,611 metres/28,251 feet, the world’s second tallest mountain is regarded by most climbers as the ultimate achievement in mountaineering. On 1 August 2008 Ger McDonnell became the first Irish person to reach the summit of...

On 27 May 1993 Dawson Stelfox became the first Irish person to reach the summit of Everest, following the route first attempted by Mallory and Irvine in 1924. This updated edition of the 1994 account recalls that groundbreaking success. It also chronicles many achievements since, including the first...

In May 1915, the RMS Lusitania, then the world’s fastest liner, departed from New York. Seven days later she was torpedoed off the Irish coast with the loss of 1,198 lives. Suspected by the Germans of carrying clandestine munitions to Britain, the great ship steamed into a fatal encounter with the...

The sinking of the Titanic is the world’s most famous sea tragedy, with over 1,500 lives lost on that cold April night in 1912. The ship has since held a special mystery and fascination for young and old. This new account for children looks at why the ship was built and the dreams of those who built...

The Shackleton of his day, Leopold McClintock from Dundalk was the leading Arctic explorer of the Victorian era. First to bring definite information on the lost Franklin party, he rose to admiral and advised Scott before the 'Discovery' expedition in 1901. This fascinating tale starts when he enlisted...

It had been a busy few days for Adolf Hitler, but Douglas Hyde had not slipped his mind … On 25 June 1938, Douglas Hyde became the first President of Ireland. His values stood in stark contrast to those of the continental dictator. As a Protestant nationalist and a leading figure in the language...

There is a large floor of broken boards, covered here and there with bit and pieces of broken linoleum. I cannot see the walls or what's above them, but there is a woman at a fire who keeps looking at me, and a man on a chair reading a paper, who keeps looking at me.' Born in a fourth-floor tenement,...

The spectacular Dingle Peninsula in southwest Ireland extends westward into the Atlantic from Tralee to Slea Head. Voted among the Top 100 destinations in the world by TripAdvisor and referred to as ‘the most beautiful place on earth’ by National Geographic, its landscape includes soaring mountaintops,...

In 1957, Sheila Cloney, Protestant wife of a Catholic farmer, fled from her home near the Wexford village of Fethard-on-Sea with her young daughters after refusing to bow to the demands of the local Catholic clergy to educate them as Catholics. In response, the priests launched a boycott of Fethard’s...

Irishman Francis Crozier was a major figure in nineteenth-century polar exploration. His voyages with Parry, Ross and Franklin lifted the veil from the frozen wastes of the Arctic and Antarctic, paving the way for Amundsen, Scott and Shackleton. The Antarctic cape named after him was immortalised...

Mike Carney was born on the Great Blasket Island in 1920 in that unique, isolated Irish-speaking community. Mike left in 1937 to seek a better future in Dublin and eventually settled in Springfield, Massachusetts, with other former islanders. The death on the island of his younger brother set off...