A gently paced, reflective debut novel, yet it still reveals the diversions, the slights and sometimes harsh stings of everyday life. Prepare to open a window to a different time, to an Ireland of faith, gossip, envy, friendship and love, set between 1879 and 1956. Anne Barnett opens up fleeting yet vivid glimpses of rural life, to thoughts and feelings, and although the focus remains on Felix and Sarah-Ann, who are fascinating in their own right, it’s the secondary characters who really bring this tale to life. The Largest Baby in Ireland After the Famine is a novel that you can dip in and out of, it doesn't demand to be read in one sitting, in fact it almost feels as though this is several short stories that intertwine and link into one novel. Enjoyable, interesting and amusing, this is a novel about real life, in all its pain and glory. ~ Liz Robinson
The Largest Baby in Ireland After the Famine Synopsis
Every Sunday the men met at the bridge. Felix Campbell was there with a couple dozen men. They were all shapes and sizes, ages and wits. What they shared was history, what they knew was their place. Farmers all, some creating the impression that they lived a more urgent and passionate existence in the fighting fields of France, than in the potato fields of reality. Felix was smoking and talking when the bridge-gatherers spotted a figure moving over the brae. The walker was a woman, most certainly, but who? Women's strict observance of the day of rest left little time for gallivanting. And where could a stranger be heading when there was nowhere she could go that the men wouldn't have known about? Then the woman appeared. She was all colour and sway, and as far away as imaginable from the local women. Pale, pale skin and strong dark auburn hair falling free to large wide hips. She wore a purple shawl. That night Felix, a bachelor, aged 43, living in the house he was born in, dreamt of purple. Purple in the shape of a woman.
