I have come across “Irish Nouns, A Reference Guide” by Andrew Carnie. Is anyone familiar with this? I’m seeking some feedback as regards quality, etc. Is it a good resource?

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Táim ag foghlaim Gaelainn na Mumhan

Tá fáilte roim nach aon cheartú!
I am a learner. Any translations offered are practice and should not be used unless confirmed.

I saw (and made comments to the author on) a pre-publication version about 5 years ago, but I haven't seen the published version so I don't know whether he took my comments into consideration or not. One warning is that he has his own system for classifying nouns into declensions. If you're accustomed to the traditional set: 1st declension like bád, 2nd declension like bróg, 3rd declension like súil, 4th declension like práta, 5th declension like lacha, you'll have to forget it for the duration of the book because he's devised a completely new system. I personally didn't see the need for a new system, as the traditional system makes sense to me. His system makes sense too, but so did the traditional system, so why not just stick to what people are used to?

Another criticism I had is that he calls the pronoun forms sé/sí/siad and é/í/iad "nominative" and "accusative" respectively, but é/í/iad aren't only accusative; they're also used for the subject in verbless sentences and small clauses like "An é an múinteóir é?", "...is í i ndiaidh an Éirne a shnámh", and "Cé a rinne sé? —Iadsan!". The Christian Brothers (at least in the 1906 version; I'm not sure about more recent versions) call the two types "conjunctive" and "disjunctive" respectively, and that makes a lot more sense. The distribution of sé (etc.) vs. é (etc.) in Irish parallels the distribution of je vs. moi in French exactly, and that's always called conjunctive vs. disjunctive. In both languages, the conjunctive forms are used immediately next to the finite verb form of which they are the subject; the disjunctive forms are used in all other cases.

But as I said, I haven't seen the published version of the book, so maybe he's changed those parts.

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GRMA as an eolas.

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Táim ag foghlaim Gaelainn na Mumhan

Tá fáilte roim nach aon cheartú!
I am a learner. Any translations offered are practice and should not be used unless confirmed.

Basically the jist is as follows.

The traditional declension system is:

1st Declension:
Genitive = Slenderise nominative. This declension is made up of masculine nouns.

2nd Declension:
Genitive = Slenderise nominative and add -e. Mostly feminine nouns

3rd Declension:
Genitive = Broaden nominative + a. Masculine and Feminine

4th Declension:
Genitive = Nominative. Masculine and Feminine ending in vowel and Masculine with -ín.

5th Declension:
Genitive = Nominative + consonant.

And finally irregular nouns.

Basically Carnie splits Declension 5 into three new declensions depending on if the consonant added is -d, -n(n) or -ach.

Also in the traditional view, -ach is slenderised to -aigh, so this change is viewed as part of the first declension (slenderise). However Carnie separates this into its own declension, since -aigh isn't really the slender version of -ach. Same with -ach goes to -aighe (-aí) which is traditionally the second declension.

Also the verbal nouns really are their own declension:
Genitive = Verbal Adjective.

Which Carnie acknowledges.

However he has one Declension class called "Genitive formed by broadening", which is present to different degrees in different dialects.

Example:
Abhainn -> Abhann.

However this is because Abhainn used to be Abha, so this used to be an -n(n) type genitive. Since the nominative was replaced with the dative (Abhainn) in some dialects. This is Carnie's last "new" declension class, and most of the words in it are ones whose dative replaced their nominative. So it depends on if this process happened in a given dialect.

This all sounds quite complicated possibly. I'll be writing notes on the Munster Declension system in Notaí an Loin Dhuibh this week.

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The dialect I use is Cork Irish.
Ar sgáth a chéile a mhairid na daoine, lag agus láidir, uasal is íseal

I'd rather say: Nominative (made broad + a) + broad consonant (d, n, nn, ch...)

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

You're right of course.

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The dialect I use is Cork Irish.
Ar sgáth a chéile a mhairid na daoine, lag agus láidir, uasal is íseal