by Edna O’Brien
First published 1987
Caithleen Brady and her best friend Baba leave their small Irish village as spirited young women, full of dreams and romantic notions. Caithleen sees the world through rose-colored glasses, believing in love and possibility, while Baba approaches life with sharp pragmatism and cynicism. As they move through relationships, marriages, and motherhood, their contrasting personalities pull them in different directions. Caithleen clings to her idealistic view of romance even as disappointments mount, while Baba adapts and survives whatever life throws at her. The years pass, transforming their youthful energy into the harder realities of middle age. Their friendship endures even as their paths diverge, one woman learning to survive through compromise, the other never quite abandoning her ungovernable heart. O'Brien traces their journey with both comedy and cruelty, showing how women's lives unfold from bright beginnings toward more complicated endings.
Genres: family-life, irish-literature, friendship, 20th-century, coming-of-age, contemporary, adult-fiction, 21st-century
Vibes: atmospheric, emotional, intimate, lyrical, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, found-family, unreliable-narrator
Setting: Ireland
Period: 20th-century, 21st-century
1 pages · Paperback · Plume