Colm Toibin&s Brooklyn is a devastating story of love loss & one woman&s terrible choice between duty & personal freedom It is Ireland in the early 1950s & for Eilis Lacey as for so many young Irish girls opportunities are scarce So when her sister arranges for her to emigrate to New York Eilis knows she must go leaving behind her family & her home for the first time Arriving in a crowded lodging house in Brooklyn Eilis can only be reminded of what she has sacrificed She is far from home
- & homesick & just as she takes tentative steps towards friendship & perhaps something more Eilis receives news which sends her back to Ireland There she will be confronted by a terrible dilemma
- a devastating choice between duty & one great love & With this elating & humane novel Colm Tóibín has produced a masterwork& Sunday Times& Unforgettable& Spectator& The most compelling & moving portrait of a young woman I have read in a long time& Zoë Heller Guardian Books of the Year& Magnificent& Sunday Telegraph&A work of such skill understatement & sly jewelled merriment could haunt your life& Ali Smith TLS Books of the Year When you are finished why not read the companion novel Nora Webster