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Trespasses

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Member Reviews

Trespasses is such quietly haunting novel about Cushla, a catholic schoolteacher and bartender during the Troubles who falls madly for an older married Protestant barrister for the IRA, Michael. Kennedy crafts a forbidden romance into a larger narrative around the personal and political tension and danger during the Troubles. Cushla as a schoolteacher tries to look out for her community, including her young student little Davy. Her relationship trying to hold together his family as well as her own reflects the instability and poverty. Kennedy's writing style is beautifully simple and pure against the darker, suspenseful backdrop. The ending really drew me in and left me breathless! Thank you to NetGalley and Riverhead for the ARC for the honest review

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In 1970s Belfast, Cushla lives a quiet life with her mom, helping her after her father's death, and she works as a teacher at Catholic school and part-time at her family's pub. But when a prominent lawyer for the IRA walks into the pub, little does she know her world will change and quickly. Michael Agnew is not only a Protestant but married, but Cushla gets swept up in his life and falls hard. When her worlds collide, they set off a chain of events that will change everything.

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The debut novel of Irish author Louise Kennedy, Trespasses, is set in Northern Ireland during the height of the Troubles, and the tension between the Catholics and Protestants is paramount to this narrative.

It follows 24-year-old Cushla Lavery and her blooming affair with the older Michael Agnew, a problematic match because Michael is married, and also a Protestant while she is a Catholic.

I recently spoke with Louise Kennedy about her own experience growing up during the Troubles and how setting can shape dialogue.

Here’s our conversation.

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Trespasses is a beautiful and haunting debut that takes place in Belfast during the Troubles. The story revolves around Cushla, a Catholic schoolteacher, and her forbidden love affair with a Protestant barrister. The passion parts are REALLY well done. Anyone who has ever been in the early throes of a love affair will feel a familiar pang reading this. But ultimately this is a book about love, not just between lovers, but love of family, love between a teacher and student, love between friends, and love of a troubled community. Also, I cried my eyes out. So if you, like me, enjoy being emotionally devastated by a book, this one is for you. Perfection.

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Whew! I can’t believe my first full time semester is over. I am slowly catching up with my reviews from earlier in November and this year. The entire month of November went in juggling publications, advising, and teaching four courses as I was getting accustomed to being full time.

During this time, I received this wonderful book which is also a story about an educator named Cushla who is based in Northern Ireland and set during the time of the Troubles. Working two jobs - one as a teacher at a parochial school, and at night, in her family’s pub. She meets and get involved with Michael Agnew, a popular lawyer who has made his name defending IRA members. Not only is Agnew a Protestant, but is also older and married. As she slowly begins an affair with him, she is caught between two different worlds. Things take a turn for a worst when one of her students, Davy’s father is found beaten, which sets a motion of events that threaten her world as she sees it.

As I am catching up with my reading, this novel drew me in because while I had heard of The Troubles (my husband’s family is half-Irish), Kenney’s novel drew me in and I read it in one-setting. I felt for Cushla and cheered for her, and often questioned her decisions, and tried to make sense of them. I am always drawn to complex, raw, and often problematic female characters because they are human, and Cushla is one of them. @Riverheadbooks is one of my favorite publishers because the editors choose books about stories that matter and need to highlighted, and this book is one of them. Through this book, one can understand the complexities and nuances that existed during the Troubles and how a woman’s decisions shape how the society sees her.

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I was really excited for this book, and my expectations were probably too high. I was hoping for a romance between two well-thought-out characters who show their softness, but instead it felt like a one-sided forbidden romance that was all lust, and no emotion. Michael Agnew is a mysterious character but I felt he fell flat.

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3.5 stars

Dark novel set in a harsh time, Belfast, Northern Ireland, mid 70s, during the Troubles.

Cushla is a Catholic schoolteacher by day and helps tend the family bar at night. The bar, along with most other aspects of society, walks a fine line between angering the Unionists and the IRA.

Cushla lives at home with her alcoholic mother. She is a committed and caring teacher who gets involved with her students and sometimes their private lives, which is tricky given the sectarian problems. One family in particular gets her attention after their father is savagely beaten and left for dead.

Cushla falls in love with one of the bar's regulars, a man unsuitable in every way. He's a Protestant, he's much older than she is, and he's married. She can't stop seeing him even though she knows things will not end will.

The novel is well-written, the starkness of the prose often matching the grimness of the setting. This is a snapshot of a particular time and set of circumstances. Thanks to the publisher and to Net Galley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

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Absolutely superb, one of the best books I’ve read all year. The author’s eye for capturing the smallest details and making beautiful the love and fragility of this relationship amidst such a harrowing backdrop. This was sensual and lusty, yet managed to cut through the noise of class and politics and religion to unearth a magnetic connection.

The way the opening of chapters crescendo into the most heartbreaking news of all was so perfectly rendered, and such an apt evocation of the complications of Cushla and Michael’s love.

I’m already hungry for more from this author!

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Trespasses takes us to Northern Ireland during the troubles. Cushla is a grade school teacher at the Catholic school. Each morning she has her students read the morning news, the bombings, stabbing and military activity are always a part of their daily lives. This simply narrative feature builds a grounding tension. Cushla's family own a bar and one evening she meets Michael. An older barrister who is doing his best to improve the politician situation. They start an affair and we are off. We feel the push and pull between Michael, her role as a teacher and her family duties.

I finished the book a week ago, just in time for the American publishing date. And I am loving it more and more as time goes on. The characters, the town and plot worked wonderfully together. And the entire book works seamlessly to create an experience full of love, fear, duty and country.

I strongly recommend this book. It is a stunning debut.

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One of the best books about the troubles I have read. Told humanely and with lyrical quality, it was just a wonderful read. Her writing is getting better.

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Trespasses may be a story about a forbidden affair and star-crossed lovers, but in Louise Kennedy’s very capable hands this Irish debut novel is not one bit sugar coated or sentimental. The story about Cushla and Michael is told in subtle, evocative, wistful, tender and sensual prose. It’s a story about passion, longing and the wish to escape a predicable life, confined by the rules of the church, family expectations and a watchful community.

Cushla is a young teacher in a Catholic school by day and a bartender in the family pub at night. Her life is busy but quiet, cleaning up after her alcoholic mother at home and her customers in the pub, teaching primary school and trying her best to help her most vulnerable pupils. But when she meets Michael everything changes. Michael is not only 30 years older than Cushla and married, but he is also a Protestant attorney, outspoken against injustice and corruption but working within the court system on terrorism-related cases in the midst of The Troubles.

Trespasses is set in Belfast in the late 1970s, and vividly evokes a time when fear, suspicion and violence seeped into everyone’s daily lives. A reader unfamiliar with the history of Northern Ireland might miss some details, but this author trusts her readers to find the information they need (some googling may be necessary for American readers) and I loved Kennedy’s restraint and lack of didacticism.

All characters feel real and honest, generous in their hearts, armed with a dry sense of humor. Both Cushla and Michael are clear eyed about the potential harm their affair might cause, yet naive about the consequences of their actions for others and themselves. We see their flaws, but still care for them and worry about their future.

This layered and brilliant book is both a compelling Irish story, a dramatic historical novel and just the kind of complex love story I’ve been looking for, and I'm so excited that it's finally released in the United States. You don’t want to miss this fantastic novel.

Thank you Riverhead Books and NetGalley for an early reader’s copy in exchange for an honest review.

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This is a quiet, brilliantly narrated story of a young woman struggling to maintain her innate kindness as the violence of The Troubles reverberates through her family and her community..
You might think you've already read the best novel about The Troubles, or wonder why you should read another novel set in that era. Do yourself a favor and read Trespasses.

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I have to be honest - I think this is only the second book I've ever read with a setting in Ireland, (the first was Here Are the Young Men by Rob Doyle) but apparently I've been missing out on quite a lot! Trespasses was a slow tale, but one that was woven together beautifully. Kennedy's stunning voice is bright and unique throughout the novel, even though the subject itself is rather grey. I'm thoroughly impressed that this book was a debut, and will definitely be adding Louise Kennedy to my authors-to-watch list.

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The Troubles in Northern Ireland are at the forefront of Trespasses by Louise Kennedy. A lonely young woman, Cushla, begins an illicit affair that begins a series of tragic events. Are they related or a random consequence of the hatred and violence that no seems able to stop?

The oppressive atmosphere is palpable as people try to go on living in an atmosphere of distrust. The title of Trespasses is very apt in its reference to The Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Kennedy gives us a beautiful character study in Cushla and a broader examination of a community during a time of repeated trespasses with dim hope for future forgiveness.

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I’m not sure I can put together the words to review this book, it was moving, I will say that. This was an experience in 300 pages. The setting of these characters is harrowing and eye opening and I found myself sucked in from the start. The Troubles isn’t something I’ve read a lot about, but Louise shared something profound with us readers. It was such a dynamic read that made me feel a range of emotions. I wanted to know what happened next and can’t wait to see what else Louise comes go with.

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I received an ARC of this novel from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

A young Irish woman is caught up in the Catholic/Protestant violence and unwittingly causes the meeting of a teenager and an older man with whom she falls in love.

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Trespasses is Louise Kennedy’s debut, a novel set against a backdrop of the Troubles in Northern Ireland; a young woman named Cushla, a primary-school teacher who falls in love with an older, married man named Michael, a barrister.

There is lots to like here, but Kennedy’s prose is for me the achievement of the novel, being well-balanced, both clean and conversational while retaining a comfortable distance from the reader. It’s a great example of writing with a clear narrative voice in close third person, writing that is flexible enough to allow for the slight detachment that is (in my mind) necessary for third person while also accommodating the informality of Cushla’s thoughts; the dry humor in some of Cushla’s observations is great.

The notation of Cushla’s physical sensation in particular is concise and lucid; I felt the characters in general were embodied, living in space. And the space itself, the physical backdrop of the scenes, is painted vividly; it seems to me that Kennedy is great at choosing her small details, the details one has to choose in order to conjure a full scene from a few words.

“Inside, dust was suspended in tobacco smoke, glittering. The stained glass in the long window on the west-facing wall was throwing gaudy shapes around the room. In the sunlight, the wood was dull with layered polish and the upholstery was shiny from spills and the rub of backsides. The old mirrors advertising bygone distilleries were bleary.”

“The room looked better with him in it. Behind him, the shabby lanterns that were fixed to the walls were casting circles of warm light on the teak tables, and there was a squalid opulence about the jade-green tweed that upholstered the banquettes and stools.”

While I can’t comment on the fidelity-to-reality of the political struggles depicted, I can say the effects that the Troubles have on the characters feel emotionally true-to-life. The gradual numbing effect the repetition of tragic events have on the characters in the novel—even the children, who become used to hearing on the news about car bombs and murders—struck a chord with me because of the similar way the pandemic has recently affected the lives of so many people I know.

I really enjoyed reading Cushla’s relationship with Michael; Kennedy’s writing about sex is very good, which isn’t surprising given her strength generally in writing about the experiences of the body. That said, all of the non-romantic relationships are well-done, too. There’s a warm reality to a character like Gina, Cushla’s mother, whose relationship with Cushla is complex; although she’s an alcoholic and drives Cushla up the wall, she’s also a crucial source of support. Cushla’s pupil, Davy, is another excellently-written character, a young boy with a wonderful heart wrapped up in awful situations. The friendship between Cushla and Gerry is probably one of my favorite parts of the novel.

There’s also something to be said for the accuracy of small-town life in Trespasses: everyone seems to know everyone else, all the time, and word travels faster by mouth than any other means. Kennedy does well in showing the messy reality of these political conflicts, and the way people who seem like friends can actually be set on opposite sides of a large divide.

A great debut. I look forward to whatever Louise Kennedy writes next.

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This book is fabulous, and I loved the setting and the storyline. I will say that it’s brutal and absolutely chilling on occasions depicting the tragedy of the religious divide and the bigotry. I do not know a ton about The Troubles so this was a great way to learn more. I cannot wait to interview Louise towards the end of the month.

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This one was pretty intriguing at the start, but the story never recovered after the first few chapters. Second round purchase for most libraries

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Was an interesting book, but I’m not sure it will work for bookclubs. I’m more likely to recommend it to specific customers in the store. Thanks for the galley.

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