Irish American Featured Book of the Month 

June 2024 - Book Club Feature
A Dance in Donegal
Jennifer Deibel
  All of her life, Irish American Moira Doherty has relished her mother's descriptions of Ireland. When her mother dies unexpectedly in the summer of 1920, Moira decides to fulfill her mother's wish that she become the teacher in Ballymann, her home village in Donegal, Ireland. After an arduous voyage, Moira arrives to a new home and a new job in an ancient country. Though a few locals offer a warm welcome, others are distanced by superstition and suspicion. Rumors about Moira's mother are unspoken in her presence but threaten to derail everything she's journeyed to Ballymann to do. Moira must rely on the kindness of a handful of friends--and the strength of Sean, an unsettlingly handsome thatcher who keeps popping up unannounced--as she seeks to navigate a life, she'd never dreamed of . . . but perhaps was meant to live.    

May 2024 - Book Club Feature
Malcolm McDowell Woods

Thomas McKay is lost. He has shuffled through life since losing his father in one of the last explosive acts of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Now he finds himself tending to his late mother's cottage in the remote, wind scoured Donegal coast and trying to connect with her enigmatic border collie. 

So begins a year of self-discovery as Thomas forms a deep bond with the dog and through her, learns to really see the world.  Their story gains international attention on social media, turning them into local celebrities and embroiling them in a battle over the future of Killfish Bay, the small cove near Dunnybegs. There is an American corporation eying the bay and an offer on the cottage. Thomas may have finally found his place in the world, but will he lose it all? What the Tide Leaves behind is a heartwarming tale of personal growth, the authentic charm of small communities and the enduring bond between man and dog. The novel explores themes of community, connection, and the transformative power of unexpected companionship.  - 

April 2024 Book Club Feature
   Maryanne J Kane  

Cruelty and kindness were the bookends of Teresa O'Mara's life in the Irish countryside of the 1920s –and beyond. Though her mother died in childbirth and her father descended into heartbreak and madness, she was sheltered by her brothers’ unwavering love. Bullying at school was tempered by friendship and a passion for learning fanned by the nuns who taught her. But an equally horrifying accident and flight to America to avoid punishment left Theresa without a lifeline of hope – or faith. Yellow Butterflies follows Theresa from innocent child in Ireland to reluctant pre-postulant and disillusioned nun hiding in an American convent – with cruelty and kindness fighting to consume themselves - and her. 

April 2024 Book Club Feature
Christina Holloway

Whispers Across A Sea is a compelling novel that traces three generations of Lucie’s Anglo-Irish family as they navigate the nuances of life in their adopted country of Ireland. Within the home, the family’s Irish servants make sure the lives of the Youngs remain comfortable while silently observing their employers’ detachment from the realities of life in Ireland—a country where a lengthy, violent, and divisive struggle is beginning. How long will the Youngs be able to close their eyes to the shifting world outside their door? 

This title will be released on April 23, 2024.

March 2024 Book Cub Feature.

In the late 1860s in Bantry, Ireland, sixteen-year-old Eileen O’Donovan is forced by her family to marry an older widower whom she barely knows and does not love. Her brother Michael, at age nineteen, becomes involved with the outlawed Irish Republican Brotherhood, a secret organization dedicated to the violent overthrow of British rule in Ireland. Their fates intertwine when they each decide to emigrate to America, where both tragedy and happiness await them. Out of Ireland brings alive the story of our ancestors who braved the dangers of immigration in order to find a better life for themselves and their families.  


February 2024 Book Club Feature

Emma-Jane Leeson

An epic tale of growth, love, loss and renewal, from Goddess to Saint.‘I am Brigid’ tells the story of one of Ireland’s most iconic women in her own words. Spanning over 5,000 years Brigid’s story is blended with words of wisdom to empower the women of today to live as fearlessly as she did. The book captures the stories of other iconic Irish figures such as the Morrigan, Dagda, Cú Chulainn and more. Taking over a year to research, write and illustrate, this book dives into Irish history and mythology, from the Tuatha Dé Danann times to the modern day. ISBN: 9781739143787

 

January 2024 Book Cub Feature.
                    Nadine Taylor

Amazon Best seller! Not the usual WWII tale, If My Heart Had Wings is the can't-put-it-down true story of star-crossed love, shattering loss, buried secrets, and a daughter's discovery of her mother's secret life. Finish it in one day—a great summer read! “Loved it! The Greatest Generation all have their secrets in this endlessly fascinating & compelling memoir.” - Reedsy Discovery “I loved it; it kept me wanting to read. A little bit of history, a little bit of mystery, and a whole bunch of love.” - Amazon Reader. “Superb! A wonderful story of devotion and tough times…” -



November 2023 Book Club Featured
"An unflinching look at the immigrant experience, an unlikely and unique friendship, and a resonant story of female empowerment."―Pam Jenoff, New York Times bestselling author of The Woman with the Blue Star.   Ellis Island, 1902: Two women band together to hold America to its promise: "Give me your tired, your poor ... your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. A young Italian woman arrives on the shores of America, her sights set on a better life. 

 December 2023 Book Club Featured
The Irish Merchant of Alicante: Moore Hall and Four Generations of Ireland's Aristocratic Moore Family. Historical novel based in Ireland and Spain during the period from 1640 to 1923. It tells the story of the Moore family who are part of the landed gentry while being Catholic. Follow the trials and tragedies of four generations as they navigate their way through turbulent Irish history, family and religious allegiances, while walking the fine line between sworn loyalty to the King and sympathy too growing Irish Nationalism. A wonderful book that is historically correct and well written. A privilege to feature this book here on this site.

August- September 2023
Book Club Featured by Heidi Daniele
In 1937, Mary Margaret Joyce is born in the Tuam Home for unwed mothers. After spending her early years in an uncaring foster home, she is sentenced by a judge to an industrial school, where she is given the name Peg, and assigned the number 27. Amid 100 other unwanted girls, Peg quickly learns the rigid routine of prayer, work, and silence under the watchful eye of Sister Constance. Her only respite is an annual summer holiday with a kind family in Galway. At the tender age of 13, Peg accidentally learns the identity of her birthmother. Peg struggles with feelings of anger and abandonment, while her mother grapples with the shame of having borne a child out of wedlock. The tension between them mounts as Peg, now becoming a young adult, begins to make plans for her future beyond Ireland.  Based on actual events, The House Children is a compelling story of familial love, shameful secrets, and life inside Ireland’s infamous industrial schools.                          

  June 2023  Book of the Month Club                     by Charles M. Carletta 
A captivating history of emigrants from County Meath to settlements along the St. Lawrence River, it is told in a clear and down-to-earth voice that will keep you turning pages into the small hours. It explores how the Irish maintained their identity despite attempts to wipe out their culture, language, and religion, and probes the reasons behind the pre-famine emigration of the 1820s and what followed with the Great Famine of 1845. The historical discussion switches in the later chapters to a multi-generational family history. Marion Tiernan’s ancestors and many of their neighbors are introduced. Their journeys from home parishes in Ireland to the new settlements are carefully laid out. The final chapters continue their family histories down to the present day.

April 2023 Book Club Featured
The Irish Nanny by Sandy Taylor.

24 Merrion Square. The house stands empty, the old stone steps overgrown with thorny rose bushes. But Mary Kate feels a deep connection to the neglected, silent rooms. Could this be the place to help her heal?

Dublin 1952. When Mary Kate Ryan receives a surprise inheritance from the woman who abandoned her as a tiny baby, she’s stunned. All her life, she has longed to know why her mother disappeared, and now she’s devastated to realize that every lonely night she spent without a home or family of her own, her mother knew exactly where she was. Mary Kate is about to refuse the money when she sees a beautiful, deserted house for sale and something sparks in her heart.   

May 2023 Book Club Featured        Traveler by John Heagney
 With little time to prepare amid the Irish War of Independence, Neddy will be swept from his parents' small Northern Ireland farm. Swept on a perilous ocean voyage alone. Swept to Canada and life as a 15-year-old indentured servant in a country of strangers. Taking with him just a battered cardboard suitcase and his dreams. 
  John Heagney is a first-generation Irish American, whose parents emigrated to the United States from Ireland and Newfoundland via Canada. He is a veteran writer and journalist who has won numerous awards and distinctions for journalistic excellence.

  March 2023 Book Club Featured             
 Gone to America by
Con Hurley and Nora Kearney. Tells the story of twelve sisters and brothers who left their home in West Cork between 1913 and 1947. They were part of the flood of Irish emigrants to North America and other parts of the world that began with the Great Irish Famine of the 184os and continued for more than a century later. The book contains some unique original material, including accounts of what it was like to travel as a third-class passenger across the Atlantic and the hard life endured by a young Kearney during the Great Depression and the War in the Pacific. No matter what part of Ireland you come from or what part of the world your ancestors came to, you will find the story of our family here.            

February 2023 Book of the Month
by Michael A Ferrill
Two Sisters - Irish Nuns in the American Civil War by Michael A Ferrill  : The true story of two Irish sisters’ journey from Ireland to American during the famine years, being accepted as religious sisters and then becoming Nursing Nuns on the Battlefields of the American Civil War. The deeds these nursing sisters performed on the battlefields of every major encounter, in the field and within the military hospitals, on both side of the Mason Dixon Line, were both humbling and heroic.    

Future Scheduled Irish-Irish American
Books for Review