Author: Tracey Lange
Published by: Celadon Books on Aug. 1, 2023
Genres: General Fiction
Pages: 288
Format: ARC, Paperback
Source: Celadon Books
Book Rating: 9/10
From Tracey Lange, the New York Times bestselling author of We Are the Brennans, comes The Connellys of County Down: a story about fierce family loyalty, good intentions gone awry, and the consequences of improbable love.
When Tara Connelly is released from prison after serving eighteen months on a drug charge, she knows rebuilding her life at thirty years old won’t be easy. With no money and no prospects, she returns home to live with her siblings, who are both busy with their own problems. Her brother, a single dad, struggles with the ongoing effects of a brain injury he sustained years ago, and her sister’s fragile facade of calm and order is cracking under the burden of big secrets. Life becomes even more complicated when the cop who put her in prison keeps showing up unannounced, leaving Tara to wonder what he wants from her now.
While she works to build a new career and hold her family together, Tara finds a chance at love in a most unlikely place. But when the Connellys’ secrets start to unravel and threaten her future, they all must face their worst fears and come clean, or risk losing each other forever.
The Connellys of County Down is a moving novel about testing the bounds of love and loyalty. It explores the possibility of beginning our lives anew, and reveals the pitfalls of shielding each other from the bitter truth.
Review:
Sincere, immersive, and insightful!
The Connellys of County Down is a tender, engaging tale that sweeps you away to Port Chester, NY and into the lives of three siblings, Tara, Eddie, and Geraldine, as they each grapple with all the secrets, wounds, trauma, tragedy, hurt, shame, guilt, tears, and discontent that surrounds them.
The prose is heartfelt and raw. The characters are complex, scarred, and loyal. And the plot is a beautifully written, affecting tale about life, loss, friendship, family, secrets, jealousy, guilt, pain, anger, denial, resentments, familial drama, forgiveness, miscommunication, and self-reflection.
Overall, The Connellys of County Down is a hopeful, absorbing, multi-generational saga by Lange that reminds us where there’s love, there’s a way and that when it comes to family, life is a combination of all the messy, frustrating, challenging, heartbreaking, complicated moments, as well as all the lovely, wonderful, touching times that happen in-between.
This novel is available on August 1, 2023.
Pick up a copy from your favourite retailer or from one of the following links.
Thank you to Celadon Books for gifting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.