LIBERTY TERRRACE (Doire Press, 2021).
‘Acutely witty… Dysfunctional families and long-lasting traumas loom large over these darkly funny stories. D’Arcy takes her cue from Martin McDonagh and John B. Keane. But countering these moments of depressing realities are moments of redress: a disabled woman and her sister slash the tyres of an inconsiderate able-bodied person; and an elderly widower battling alcoholism takes a young squatter under his wing. After all, as the last story notes, we’re just off Hope Street. ’ Tanvi Roberts, Irish Times, 4/12/21.

‘… a charming, honest commentary on modern Ireland, reminiscent of Donal Ryan’s The Spinning Heart. Enchanting and engaging.’ Margaret Bonass Madden, Sunday Independent, 10/10/21.

‘She has a knack for getting into the heart of a story and a character in just a few lines… D’Arcy’s stories work because her characters feel believable, even the unsavoury ones, and we find ourselves desperately hoping that the others will get their act together and sort their lives out…’ John Walshe, Sunday Business Post, 12/12/2021

‘These are fizzing dark comedies with deadly serious intent from a natural storyteller. A fantastic collection.’ Kevin Barry.

‘The stories in Liberty Terrace are intimate, humane and wickedly funny. Moving and perceptive, these stories are by turns unsettling and luminous. A triumph!’ Danielle McLaughlin.

‘Liberty Terrace is the world in merciless microcosm. Madeleine D’Arcy’s writing will make you laugh out loud and smart with painful recognition. A fond, sharp take on Lockdown.’ Mary Morrissy.

‘… In just a few pages, Madeleine D’Arcy captures a poignancy, a pain, a hopelessness and a hopefulness… Liberty Terrace is a very confident collection of short stories that will appeal to many, but in particular to readers who can fully appreciate the mastery required to write in this style. …’ Mairead Hearne, Swirl and Thread.
‘The stories are bursting with heart and compassion, and each one is beautifully circular in structure… I was left with the feeling that I’d been privy to something really special… ’ Emma McEvoy, Emma’s Book Blog
 
WAITING FOR THE BULLET (Doire Press, 2014)
 
‘Perhaps likeable heroes and hateable villains are a mark of cheap-and-easy fiction but balancing the black and white in characters is different – a test of the author’s engagement with life as it is, with people as they are, rather than with the storyteller’s stock in trade… Madeleine D’Arcy is a name you will not want to forget, when you have had these extraordinary privileged glimpses into her dark world.’ Jeremy Addis, Books Ireland (September/October 2014).
 
‘I endorse, without reservations of any kind, WAITING FOR THE BULLET, to all lovers of a superbly crafted short story. The stories are beautifully written, at times nearly heartbreakingly sad, funny, and not without some interesting sexual scenarios. I think another great storyteller from Cork, Frank O’Connor, would have been an admiring reader of WAITING FOR THE BULLET.’ Mel Ulm, The Reading Life.
 
‘And there it is again, that juxtaposing of light and dark, of sweet and bitter, a hallmark of this assured and carefully crafted collection whose stories will follow you around ling after you’ve stopped laughing.’ Danielle McLaughlin, The Stinging Fly, Issue 29, Volume 2, Winter 2014.
 
‘A sharp, terse, funny collection of snappy short stories from an up-and-coming Irish talent. … Pithy, horrible, hilarious; you’ll love it.’ Valerie O’Riordan, Bookmunch.
 
‘In WAITING FOR THE BULLET, the ammunition is the few sentences in a story that hit the reader and change everything – literary bullets that reveal this collection and its author’s true explosive power.’ Alison Wells, Writing.ie