Brooklyn

The great modern novel of leaving Ireland, and of being pulled back.

Why Consider This One

Eilis Lacey leaves 1950s Enniscorthy for New York because there is no work for her at home, builds a tentative life there, and is then drawn back to Ireland by a death in the family and a choice she never expected to face. Colm Tóibín writes ordinary lives with such quiet control that the smallest decisions carry enormous weight. Nothing is overstated, and that is exactly why the ending lands as hard as it does.

Choose this if you want the emigrant story that sits at the center of so much Irish writing, told without a trace of sentimentality. It is a step up in length and patience from the start-here pick, but it rewards that patience, and it was adapted into an acclaimed film with Saoirse Ronan if you want to see it after.

What to Expect

A calm, unhurried narrative that follows one woman across the Atlantic and back. Understated on the surface, with strong feeling held just beneath it. The kind of book whose full effect you only feel in the last few pages.