LONG ISLAND

Eilis Lacey, an Irishwoman in her forties, is married to Tony Fiorello, one of four Italian-American brothers living together with their families in Lindenhurst, Long Island. Although she has two teenage children, Eilis feels isolated in a country that is still new to her. Eilis and Tony have built a secure, happy life here since leaving Brooklyn - perhaps a little stifled by the in-laws so close, but twenty years married and with two children looking towards a good future. One spring day in 1986, a man with an Irish accent knocks on Eilis Fiorello's door and in that moment everything changes. He brings shocking news: his wife is pregnant with Tony's child, and he intends to leave the baby on Eilis's doorstep. It is Eilis's response, and the choices she refuses to make, that drive this extraordinary, riveting story. With silences that are thunderous and dangerous, Long Island is a beautifully written tale of a woman alone in her marriage, and the profound bonds she rekindles upon returning to Enniscorthy, Ireland, the place and people and love she thought she had left behind. A masterpiece from the award-winning literary novelist Colm Tóibín. An unputdownable, searing love story. 294 pages.