Book description
'Marvellous.' Susan Hill, The Times Elizabeth Reegan, after years
of freedom - and loneliness - marries into the enclosed Irish village
of her upbringing. The children are not her own; her husband is
straining to break free from the servile security of the police force;
and her own life, threatened by illness, seems to be losing the last
vestiges of its purpose. Moving between tragedy and savage comedy,
desperation and joy, John McGahern's first novel is one of haunting
power. 'The details are evoked with a scrupulous yet enhancing
accuracy that reminds one of the young Joyce. He is astonishingly
successful in penetrating the mind of a mature woman confronted with
pain and death. Mr McGahern is the real thing.' Spectator
John McGahern was born in Dublin in 1934 and brought up in the
Republic of Ireland. He trained to be a primary-school teacher before
becoming a full-time writer, and later taught and travelled
extensively. He lived in County Leitrim. The author of six highly
acclaimed novels and four collections of short stories, he was the
recipient of numerous awards and honours, including a Society of
Authors Travelling Scholarship, the American-Irish Award, the Prix
Etrangère Ecureuil and the Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des
Lettres. Amongst Women, which won both the GPA and the Irish Times
Award, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and made into a four-part
BBC television series. His work appeared in numerous anthologies and
has been translated into many languages. In 2005, his autobiography,
Memoir, won the South Bank Literature Award. John McGahern died in 2006.
