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Lädt ... A River in the Treesvon Jacqueline O'Mahony
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Two women. Two stories. One hundred years of secrets. A sweeping novel of love, loss, family and history for readers who love Maggie O'Farrell, John Boyne and Donal Ryan 'Thrilling, thoughtful, passionate' Daily Mail'Beautiful, unsentimental, intelligent' The Times1919Ireland is about to be torn apart by the War of Independence.Hannah O'Donovan helps her father hide rebel soldiers in the attic, putting her family in great danger from the British soldiers who roam the countryside. An immediate connection between Hannah and O'Riada, the leader of this hidden band of rebels, will change her life and that of her family forever . . . 2019Ellen is at a crossroads: her marriage is in trouble, her career is over and she's grieving the loss of a baby. After years in London, she decides to come home to Ireland to face the things she's tried so hard to escape. Reaching into the past, she feels a connection to her ancestor, the mysterious Hannah O'Donovan. But why won't anyone in her family talk about Hannah? And how can this journey help Ellen put her life back together?'A gripping novel about two women, their desires and frustrations, about the wars they find themselves fighting . . . a thrill to discover' Belinda McKeon 'A fierce, beautifully written story' Louise O'Neill Keine Bibliotheksbeschreibungen gefunden. |
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The novel opens in 1919, with the O’Donovan family in their farmhouse kitchen awaiting a group of young volunteer Irish “freedom fighters”—led by the dashing Padraic O’Riada—whom they have agreed to shelter from the Black and Tans, constables of the Royal Irish Constabulary, most of whom have been recruited from England to suppress the IRA. Nineteen-year-old Hannah, the eldest O’Donovan daughter and her father’s favourite, is sympathetic to the cause and the likely reason he’s agreed to allow these fugitives into the house at all.
Once the men are ensconced in the secret attic room, it is Hannah who brings them their meal and tells them what to do when the Tans make an earlier-than-expected raid. On first encountering him, Hannah experiences a powerful attraction to the striking O’Riada. After the Tans’ attack leaves the young woman roughed-up and bleeding and her father badly injured with multiple fractures and blind in one eye, she walks outside to meet O'Riada
For most of the book, chapters alternate between Hannah’s story (the better one by far, for what it’s worth) and that of Ellen, her 21st-century Irish-born descendent, a beauty columnist with a large British newspaper. Ellen lives in luxury in London with her wealthy, handsome, and increasingly distant husband, Simon. Now thirty-eight (twice Hannah’s age), Ellen has had several miscarriages and, recently, a stillbirth. When she’s not lamenting her lost youth and beauty, obsessing about her thick legs and clutching at her abdominal fat, she engages in interior moan-ologues about having had a Mammy who didn’t love her, no friends, and a mocking, disdainful husband. She alternates between histrionics—wanting “to run around the fields pulling her clothes off” in an act of defiance against the “tight little box of explaining herself to Simon”—and passivity: wishing she could just fade away into the earth. At first, I believed she was in Ireland to commit suicide, but, no, she’s apparently learned that the O’Donovan farm is on the market. She seems to be possessed of the odd notion that purchasing it, on her unloving husband’s dime, will restore her to psychological health. While staying at a hotel not far from the ancestral home, she does learn a fair bit about the O’Donovans from the locals, including a surprising secret that has personal relevance.
In case you haven’t noticed, I didn’t get on with this book. The problems came thick and fast, starting on page 3, when Ellen notices, while driving, that her breasts are “sitting on the high mound of her stomach.” But wait; it gets worse: those breasts “begin nuzzling each other like little overfed animals.” I could go on . . .
I’m sure there are some great novels about Irish War of Independence, and I bet there area few good ones about the stories old houses could tell. This, alas, is not one of them. ( )