Emma Donoghue is very hit or miss for me. While I think its incredible how she can create these worlds that feel so well thought out, this one might have been a little too remote and removed for me. If you like her writing it is worth a shot, but if she is hit or miss for you, it might be worth skipping.

I enjoyed this latest novel by Emma Donoghue. The premise is intriguing and there is lots to think about in our current pandemic context relating to isolation, connection and community. Beautifully written. Thank you for the advance copy.

Haven is the story of three Irish monks who set out from their inland monastery to build an outpost for Christendom on a remote island off the western coast of Ireland dreamt of by the living saint and scholar who becomes their Prior. The story is loosely based on and inspired by the history of Skelling Michael, an imposing, rocky island settled in the 6th-8th century A.D. by Christian monks and remarkably well-preserved even now.

The primary conflict in the book is between the Prior whose eye is always fixed on the intangible and divine and the monks who must concern themselves with the practical and physical aspects of survival in increasingly fraught conditions. The monks want to dig a cistern for drinking water; the prior requires a standing cross carved first. They want to build shelter to keep them safe from storms; he requires them to build an altar for mass. Ominous and increasingly heartbreaking, the story hurtles toward its inevitable conclusion.

Donoghue has the ability to focus in on a specific time and place and exquisitely draw compelling human drama. It was true for Room, The Wonder, The Pull of the Stars, and it is true for Haven. Donoghue is more overt in those themes in this book: the capable and practical must care for the naive, mislead, or incapable. And they face considerable obstacles doing so.

Muted and understated, I found it mesmerizing reading the innovative solutions the monks undertook to carve out habitable space on the island. It was a kind of meditation to read each step in every painstaking task. There is exquisite tension between the otherworldly and the necessary tasks of survival in every chapter. There is also tragedy creeping up with every page turn. This is not an action-packed story, but instead a moody and atmospheric rumination on the marvel of human persistence.

Many thanks to @netgalley for this ARC.

i wanted to love this book as I have read most of Donoghue's previous books. This however, was so boring! I got the whole GOD is good, look at what he has given us in the very beginning and again and again and again. I knew it wasn't going to be Room,, I knew it was a different tale than Slammerkin or even Frog Music, I was willing to go away from those beloved books and give this a try , but I just couldn't get into it. This is not to say that the words themselves were not beautifully written. The depth of description was present throughout, and a gift, but plot is important as well.

I thoroughly enjoyed Haven by Emma Donoghue. The author painted a rich landscape as a setting for the story. The characters were well developed and intriguing. I especially enjoyed the character Cormac. I found myself rooting for his survival. Though outside my usual genre, I found the tale interesting and entertaining.

🌟Book Review🌟
Thank you to @netgalley and the publisher for the advanced review copy.

Release Date: August 2022
GENRE: Historical Fiction

3 religious men set out on a small boat in search for a island after their leader has a dream.

This book caught my attention because of the premise and author but I'm so sad to say it wasn't for me. The writing is undeniably beautiful, but I just couldn't fall in love with the characters and with the lack of adventure, it fell short.  The characters lacked conviction and the plot lacked excitement. I just found it boring and couldn't get excited about the story. Because the writing is superb, and I've loved the author's other books, I rounded up to three stars. You might like it, or even love it if you don't mind a really slow plot.

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Skellig Michael is an imposing island. With harsh, jutting summits and steep, narrow paths, it's an island that screams unforgiveness. And I just found this particular story to be a little too humble, a little too one-note to do the island's history and atmosphere justice.

I do think the story itself is very interesting. I love a good survival plot, so I was looking forward to reading about three monks settling an inhabitable island in the name of God. I just wish there had been a greater sense adventure when it came to their actual island experience.

And with the writing being as nice as it is and the characters so quiet, again, I just think the narrative is a little too meek for heart of the story. If I wasn't so interested in the particular history of the island, I probably would have been bored by it all.

So a good book to pick up for readers who have a particular interest in the topic, but I don't think this will appeal to the mass majority.

A really great little book. It's fairly short, something that could easily be read in a day or a few sittings. I actually really like books about monks (think Cadfael or Matthew Bartholomew) even though I am not religious. However, I really don't like it when books with religious characters turn from historical religiosity to preaching. This book does a great job of portraying very devout monks without crossing that line into trying to convert strangers. The author did a great job making the entire book very atmospheric, from the walls of the monastery to the boat trip to the scenes of life on the island. I loved how much this book sucked me in. When I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about it. When I was reading it, I could barely remember there was a book in my hands because the scenes from the book played so vividly behind my eyes. This is my fourth book by Emma Donoghue but it will definitely not be my last! It really was quite fantastic.

I received a free copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This wasn't for me. I thought it would be interesting and I love Ms. Donahue's writing style. Some of it was interesting but it was very predictable and I found myself struggling to continue reading (which is rare for me with an ED book)

Powerful, absorbing and unique are just a few of the words that describe Emma Donoghue’s ‘Haven’.
The prose are beautiful, artistic in nature as they paint a picture of three monks Artt, Trian and Cormac, their journey from the River Shannon to the open Atlantic and their arrival on the isolated island of Skellig Michael.
As told in his dream, Artt listens and will leave the world he knows behind. Accompanied by the elder Cormac and the young Trian, they will search and find a spot to build a monastery in their service to God. When they arrive on Skellig Michael it is uninhabited except for the birds and greenery and the gifts of nature. What happens between the monks is a path of religion, self-discovery and the strength and fragility of the human spirit.
The words and images they invoke will grip and intrigue. It is as much a story as it is a meditation.
Highly recommended.
With thanks to NetGalley, Little, Brown and Company and Emma Donoghue for an ARC in exchange for an honest book review.

2.5 stars

In 1800s Ireland, a storied priest visiting a small monastery receives a vision in the form a dream, urging him to set off with two monks in search of an uninhabited island to declare their own. Artt assures his fellow travelers that while they now are in service to him, they are all partners. Upon arriving to their newfound home, the craggy and tall island duo christened Great Skellig (and based on an actual Island, per the author notes at the end), the trio is welcomed with many challenges in making the space inhabitable.

Donaghue gives us well-explored characters in Artt, Trian, and Cormac. So much so that I very quickly hoped pious Artt (quite literally finding himself “holier than thou”) would tragically fall from the top of Great Skellig. In turn though, that opened us to receive Trian and Cormac with such affection and openness, especially with their honest intentions in trying to follow Artt’s commands and priorities while struggling with feelings that leaned towards insubordination.

The book read painfully slow for the most part… like a fire that smolders but never flames. Trian’s secret toward the end felt thrown in and unresolved. On the other hand, I learned much about what is best fuel for a fire when on a deserted island.

* Thank you to Netgalley and for this ARC. This review represents opinions all my own. *

This book was incredibly difficult to get into and very boring. There was essentially no plot other than 3 monks go to an island and struggle to survive. I highly do not recommend.

I enjoyed this book. The prose was well-written, and the characters were dynamic and jumped off the page. I thought the story was interesting and the plot kept me guessing.

This is definitely not like any other Emma Donoghue books I have read (The Pull of the Stars being my one of my favourite books!). I wanted to love Haven as I have loved Donoghue’s other books but I just couldn’t. I found it to be very slow and descriptive, making it difficult to get into and could not hold my interest. Honestly if I hadn’t agreed to review it, I would not have finished it.
Thanks to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Emma Donoghue is a favorite author of mine, I am always excited to see a new title from her in the pre-publication pipeline. Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC.
Donoghue's prose is heartbreakingly beautiful. Her research is both broad and deep, evidenced in her ability to create the history of time and place so thoroughly, you can see and taste and hear and smell every detail, pleasant or not. Against these backdrops, she drills down on the mores of time and place, as well as the roles of religion, class, and gender and how these overlap or clash for her protagonist and supporting characters.
For this reader, the journey eclipses everything else.

Every now and then I will finish a book and go huh. And that huh means that I have no idea how I am going to rate a book because I don't even know how I feel about it. I'm going to give this four stars because it lives between three stars (had a hard time getting through it) and five stars (I think this one is going to stick with me).
My discovery reading this book is that I am not cut out to be a monk. And that is the most understated statement I could probably ever make. This book required discipline to get through it of which I have very little but just enough I suppose that I did finish. Being a monk requires blind obedience. I was way too angry throughout this book to think I could even possess obedience let alone the blind type. I can think of at least 500 examples of where I would have broken my vow of disobedience and told Artt (the so called pious one who lacks any sense of humility) to shove it up his ass. And poverty. Sure, that's fine. I'm all about being resourceful and sorting between wants and needs Artts poverty compulsion was a bit extreme by any standard and if I have to choose between my life and masochistic poverty... Well, I choose life. So, Emma Donoghue, if your intent was to take me on an experiential journey then you mastered it. This book was extremely slow-paced and at times downright torturous journey where I often felt pissed off the characters, the pacing, and at myself for continuing to read on anyhow. As I'm writing this, I will not be surprised if my rating of this Godawful book evolves into a five by tomorrow morning.

“Such divine handiwork. The book of the earth has enigmatic passages that Trian can’t interpret, but still he loves to read it. It seems to him that nature is God’s holiest language. Everything created seems to express its Creator; everything cries out, You made me..”

Haven is both quintessentially Emma Donoghue while also being quite different from any of her other novels. The language is beautiful and the atmosphere building is fabulous! There were times I could imagine being on the skellig with the monks, surrounded by cawing birds and daunting peaks and crashing waves. Donoghue is amazing at creating environments in small spaces, as well as examining the different layers that lie inside each character. Her casts of characters tend to be small, which allows ample time and space to delve into their psyches, motivations, strengths, and weaknesses.

Much of this book is slow going, and it took me a while to get through it. So while I loved getting to know the characters through and through, it felt like a lot of effort to get to the point where I really wanted to keep reading. I did eventually get to that point, so I’m glad for that!

The characters had varying levels of like-ability, and the reader can empathize with those questioning some of the philosophies being told to them from authority figures and rule-makers. I can relate to questioning the motivations and teachings of certain spiritual leaders and the desire to explore and test my own faith, much as some of the characters do in the book.

As actions and motives seem to become more and more troubling, the story comes to a pretty quick conclusion that was simultaneously sad and satisfying.

It took a while, but I came to enjoy the book quite a bit! I’d recommend it for people who really enjoy slow burn books; this is a character-driven story without much action.

I finished this book only because I have really enjoyed Emma Donoghue’s other books and I was sure this one was going to pick up any minute. Unfortunately for me it never did, the characters are bland and even the parts of the book which were supposed to be surprising were not very well investigated or expanded upon,
I will say that the island of Skellig Michael which inspired the island in the book which the monks sailed to is very interesting and I found researching it fascinating.

I wanted to read this solely because of the author (and the mysterious, vaguely sinister cover art!). I've really enjoyed Emma Donoghue's books, especially The Pull of the Stars and Frog Music. Had Haven been written by almost anyone else, I probably wouldn't have considered it - a tale of three monks living in the early middle ages is far from my typical choice. That said, I'm very glad I did. I didn't necessarily love this book, but I found myself completely absorbed in it - I HAD to talk about it as I was reading it (to the point that my husband, not a huge reader, is eager to read it when it's available).

It's very much about religion, but it's also about the struggle to reconcile what you feel in your deepest self to be true about the world with what your 'superior' is insisting is incontrovertible fact. While I couldn't relate directly to many of the things depicted in the book - from the devoutly religious, like vowing chastity, poverty, humility, and (most important to the plot) obedience, to the day-to-day of the monks' isolated existence, like writing on calfskin vellum and trying to carve out a garden from unforgiving rock - it reminded me in some strange but strong ways of Silicon Valley in the 21st century and the cult of tech leadership we buy into out of some combination of hope and willful delusion (e.g., Theranos). The power dynamics were easily the most fascinating part of the story for me. I also find myself coming back to the haunting implications - even back in the 600s, and exponentially so today - of the belief that everything on earth was put there by God for humans to use.

Overall, a really unusual and well-written meditation on what it means to be a 'leader' and how to do right in the world. Recommend!

Thanks to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Emma Donoghue’s latest, Haven, is a strange story but also bizarrely enchanting. Artt, a visiting monk and revered holy man, has a dream about an island called Hibernia, where he will set up a true monastery and practice the faith purely. In his dream, he’s accompanied by two other monks, one old and one young. Artt invites Cormac, an old man but only a monk for 15 years, and Trian, a young monk not more than a boy, to accompany him.

They set out to find this island, with few items - Artt is attempting to mould them into better, more pious, more trusting monks - and eventually end up on a small skellig, believed to be their island. However, their faith and patience with one another is tested, with Artt being a cold and commanding prior for their new order.

This was compelling in ways I didn’t expect. Donoghue is of course a masterful writer, and I’ve always been impressed with the range of stories in her works. Haven is no different: challenging, thoughtful, and emotional.