Bradbury considers Green Shadows to be the culmination of thirty-five years of short stories, poems, and plays that were inspired by his stay in Ireland.

[citation needed] As with most of his previous short-story collections, including The Illustrated Man and The Martian Chronicles, many of the short stories were originally published elsewhere and modified slightly for publication in the novel.

The narrator checks in at the Royal Hibernian Hotel in Dublin before leaving for Heeber Finn's Pub in Kilcock, where he converses with several local characters.

Some critics gave the work high praise: Publishers Weekly said it was a "lighthearted, beguiling autobiographical novel", concluding, "Bradbury's prose is as vibrant and distinctive as the landscape in which these delightful tales are set."

[1] The Chicago Tribune criticized Bradbury's "tin ear" for dialogue, complaining that "All of his Irish characters talk like Barry Fitzgerald reciting Seán O'Casey to a busload of tourists from Tulsa.