A Saga of the struggle between hard-living farmers and the Church, The Bodhran Makers is set in rural Ireland in the 1950s. The Bodhran (pronounced bough-rawn) makers of the title are "a poverty-stricken people who never lost their dignity." Every January, they celebrate their Celtic ancestry with a festival of singing, drinking, and music-making with the Bodhran, a drum made from goat skin. This particular year, however, the revelers are confronted by the parish priest and his cohorts in the local village, who disapprove of the ancient rites on the grounds they are "immoral, drunken, and degenerate." In this faithful re-creation of the life of a spirited people doomed to crushing poverty, Keane documents the death of the old traditions, and, in doing so, the birth of modern Ireland.<BR>The Bodhran Makers grew out of a promise Keane made to an old Irishman to commemorate the music, songs, and traditions of rural Ireland in a novel. "He told me he'd haunt me if I didn't keep my promise." Keane says. "Both he and his people have all gone now, so I'm glad l wrote the book."