For the initial couple of days, the coverage of the death and funeral of Charles Haughey was characterised by extremes – on the one hand, the inevitable regurgitation of historical hatreds and the replaying of Haughey's defects and misdeeds; on the other, the attempted veneration of his legendary status as statesman and cultural icon. Almost anything you could lay your eye on was manifestly written by a friend or a foe.

A recent UK poll of book sales showed that the ever-growing number of outlets that sell books are catering to vastly different tastes.

Billy Leahy looks at two artists exhibiting at the Douglas Hyde gallery – emerging Irish artist Mark Garry and San Francisco-based Laura Owens

Nostalgia is the order of the day as BBC2 revisits Britain in the '90s and Channel 4 wheels out Noel Edmonds in a bizarre new box-obsessed quiz show

Blue/Orange covers some familiar territory but all is not quite as it seems, says Edward O'Hare

A number of leading Sinn Féin activists in Dublin have left the party to establish a "Socialist Republican campaign group" called Éirigí. The new group, launched last month with a "Reclaim the Republic" campaign, includes Stewart Reddin, former Dublin Sinn Féin organiser; Joanne McDonald, the sister of Mary Lou McDonald, the party's Dublin MEP; and Brian Leeson, a former party organiser. Éirigí translates from Irish as "arise" or "rise up".

As fast food outlets colonise the world, there is even a McDonalds in Guantanamo Bay. 'Chew on This' chronicles the growth of this industry, the tactics it uses to attract children and the detrimental effects it has on the world's health. Rosita Sweetman reviews Eric Schlooser's latest critique of the fast food industry.

Elina Brotherus' work is on a par with the masters of painting and photography, writes Billy Leahy

We think it's the underpants that did it. While other dictators have maintained, in death, their air of menace and evil, the carefully orchestrated shots of Saddam Hussein in his jockeys were as effective and emasculating as the US administration intended.

Now that the dust has settled on this year's Bisto Book of the Year awards I thought that it might be a good time to make my own list of books that didn't win and which should not be forgotten, as can so often happen when awards are handed out. So here is my aide memoir, in no particular order.