Set in nineteenth-century Ireland in the aftermath of the Great Famine, Land follows Tomás, a surveyor, and his family as their lives unfold under the pressures of loss, faith and displacement. Beginning with a mapping expedition undertaken by Tomás and his young son, Liam, the novel expands across generations and continents, intertwining a family’s history with the enduring mysteries of the landscape. Beautifully written and deeply absorbing, Land is both eerie and inspiring. Maggie O’Farrel...
Sean Hewitt’s Open Heaven explores adolescent desire through the memory of a fascination that never quite becomes a love story. It opens with James returning to his village to visit the farm where Luke once lived. From there, the narrative looks back to James at sixteen, captivated by a handsome boy staying with his uncle amid difficult family circumstances, including his father’s imprisonment. The novel’s most appealing quality is its modest narrative scope. This is not a grand romance that ...
Cal Macleod is a young textile student in Edinburgh when his father, John, orders him home to the Isle of Harris to look after his grandmother Ella. Back in the family croft, among sheep, looms and a strict Presbyterian community, the three of them share a house and a habit of saying very little to one another. Each guards a secret, and Douglas Stuart takes his time revealing how many of those secrets are already known. John of John is his third novel, and it takes him from Glasgow to the Out...
