This warm and funny novel set in 1950s Ireland by the prolific North Kerry novelist, balladeer, essayist and playwright conjures a now lost way of life. The Catholic Church intervenes when local villagers get ready to perform a traditional (and the church says pagan) January Wrendance. Keane, who died in 2002, writes lyrically of traditional Irish music (the Bodhran is a goatskin drum) and folkways. His Listowel pub is a literary landmark.  (IRE142, $14.95)