3.5 rounded up to 4.

The word 'confession' has an overall heavy connotation and this book was HEAVY from start to finish. It swaps perspectives and timelines and moves between New York and a small town in Ireland.

I really enjoyed how the stories wove into one another and intersected. The characters were dealing with serious emotions, feelings and circumstances beyond their control. They definitely had their own unique way of dealing with life and the hands they were dealt.

There were four main characters throughout the story. None of them were particularly loveable and I certainly didn't feel a connection to any of them. I felt FOR them, but not about them.

I'm not sure if this would be considered a spoiler, so stop reading right here if you haven't finished the book. The video game. I'm sure it had some deep and significant reason for being included, but I'm not sure exactly what. I think it's misleading to include in the synopsis, especially if you're someone who likes video games and go into the book thinking you'll get video game content. I understand how it connects the women, I'm just not sure why it's really relevant.

My god, this book was just perfect. I didn’t know what to expect going in but I know it far exceeded those expectations. An actual masterpiece, in my eyes.

I love books that follow families across generations when it’s done well and it was done masterfully in Confessions. We see the way sisters, Roisin and Maire’s decisions affect their lineage for decades spanning from Ireland to New York City and back again.

Devastating, beautiful, mesmerizing - exploring motherhood, sisterhood, love, grief, betrayal.

The fact that this is Catherine Aireys debut and can go toe to toe with the best modern classics blows my mind. I truly can’t wait to read whatever she puts out in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley for this ARC!

I can't believe this was a debut novel. I was captivated from the very beginning and all the way to the end. This novel follows three generations of women between New York and Ireland. The characters and their story are woven together in a beautiful and emotional way. It's full of details, history, love and secrets. I absolutely adored this story and I look forward to reading more from Catherine Airey.

Not sure if this is really for me, but I think it's still very good book. I like the pacing, it was done very well and the settings were pretty good and well done. However, some of the shifting perspectives didn't do it for me, and it did get to a point where some of it just did not connect or make sense anymore.
I do think that for those who can really connect with this story it will mean something to them. It was overall, a good read.

Really hooked by Cora and the beginning of the book, which was so evocative and beautifully written. Lost steam when it jumped to other characters and eras.

I was so excited when I first heard about this book as it was lauded as the next Goldfinch/ Tomorrow+Tomorrow+Tomorrow — but I struggled through it. I was initially drawn in by the first section of this book, Cora's story, which was compelling and well-written. The author definitely has a way to put the reader directly into the story. However, when the point of view shifted, I found myself at a loss to stay engaged and kept picking up other books. The pacing felt slow, and the new perspectives didn’t capture my interest as much as the beginning. It also focuses on a variety of themes that were not interesting to me (intergenerational trauma, reproductive rights, complex familial relationships). I can see how it might appeal to readers — Unfortunately, it just wasn’t the right fit for me.

4.5

Setting: Ireland and New York
Rep: one queer protagonist

This book is long and it's slow paced and right when you get into a perspective, it switches, and it took me a while to read. But I ended up so invested in these characters and how they all connected, to the point that when I spotted a connection before the characters did I actually gasped. Despite being nearly 500 pages, it feels like there is SO MUCH that goes unsaid/up for interpretation - this would make an excellent book club book as there is so much food for thought here.

I was hooked at first with Cora’s perspective, but the second-person narration for one character threw me off. Once I got past that, though, I really enjoyed how the stories of these messy, strong women came together. It was emotional, deep, and hard to put down.

I have complicated feelings about this book.

I loved the beginning, which is written in first person from Cora’s perspective. The immersive writing held me right there inside the story.

Then we jump back in time with Roison’s POV character, which is written in third person. I enjoyed getting to know her, and I was still very much invested.

But then, about 100 pages in, we switch to Maire’s POV character, which is written in second person. And this is where the book started to lose me. Second person narration doesn’t work well for me at all. I felt disconnected from the characters and the emotions. Unfortunately, this section was over 100 pages long.

Eventually, we returned to the other POVs, and I was pulled back in.

The story is emotional, sad, deep, intense, thought provoking, and realistic. The way the characters’ lives intersect and the fallout from certain actions is woven together with perfection.

The stylistic choice of a narrating character written in second person was a miss for me. But to be clear, the disconnect I felt was specific to that POV style, not the content.

Confessions is a book of interesting character and scenarios. I was drawn in by the beginning when we meet Cora as she is dealing with the loss of her mother and more recently her father who is lost in the World Trade Center attacks.
The underlying details of the Scream School game are cleverly intertwined within the book.
I enjoyed how all of the characters of the book were all woven into the story as it traversed back and forth in time.
A good read which I will be recommending.

What a debut! I almost DNF’d this since I found that the beginning was too slow for my taste, and I kept putting this one aside and reading other books, but I persisted and at about 30% I just couldn’t put it down.

What an incredible story about women and family. Loved the way that the different POV sections were presented so that you could spend time getting to know each character.

Can’t wait to read this author’s next book!

Once you start reading you will have a hard time putting this down, as I did. The female characters are strong if flawed. Story covers different timelines and there are several POVs which connect together. This was an amazing debut!
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advance copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

We love a messy protagonist! Bonus points for multiple messy protagonists! Great dialogue around loss, grief, relationships, and life in general through generations of women.

For fans of Tracey Lange and Ann Napolitano, Confessions by Catherine Airey is a multi generational tale of loss, family, and self actualization. Confessions spans decades and continents from the 1970s to the 2020s, from Ireland to the United States and back again. It features a family of women, the men who define their lives, and the secrets that bind them all together.

I appreciated what the author was trying to do. but each character's story was so big that by including them all, I felt like none received their due diligence. Perhaps one less generation of the family may have left enough time to dive deeper into Máire and Róisín's relationship as children, Máire's time with the Screamers, and Cora moving to Ireland with Róisín. I enjoyed the characters and their stories, I just wanted more of them!

Amazing! I am impressed that this is a debut! An emotive read exploring love and loss from different perspectives, places, and points in time. Definitely check it out!!

Loved this unique story and the way in which it was told. Would definitely recommend this read to other people looking to get into this interesting genre.

The description of #Confessions is well placed: "For fans of The Goldfinch and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow." The story follows three generations of women in New York City and in rural Ireland. The grandmother, mother, daughter, and all the people who come in and out of their lives over the decades weave together a complex and interrelated story. The book is written out of order, with each character having their own chapters. While this style helps the reader to layer pieces of the story through each other, it at times also leave a lot to the imagination, which is both good and bad. I appreciate the complexity and the discussion of how no one is truly good or bad over this whole timeline. This book is not for high school libraries necessarily, but it would be a good recommendation to mature teen readers as well as adults. Thank you to Net Galley and the publishers for this ARC.

"We are only as sick as our secrets." -Roisin Dooley

This book is full of secrets...we start with Cora Brady in 2001 in New York City.  She has already lost her mother and then loses her father in the 9/11 attacks. It's hard to believe that Confessions is a debut novel, because it is SO GOOD. I am always drawn to multi-generational family sagas and this one is rich with drama, history and love. The characters and stories are woven together so well that it is really easy to get lost in this book.  It will certainly be one of my top 5 books of the year.

*Thanks to NetGalley for a free copy in exchange for honest review. All opinions are my own.*

Catherine Airey’s debut novel, Confessions, delivers an evocative, multi-generational tale of family, loss, and secrets, spanning from New York City in the aftermath of 9/11 to the misty hills of Ireland. This is no simple family drama; it’s a journey through trauma, fractured relationships, and the ways in which past choices echo through generations.

The story opens with Cora, a young girl navigating the chaos of New York City in September 2001. Cora’s father is missing, one of the countless names on the haunting missing persons posters that blanketed the city after 9/11. Cora’s mother has long since vanished from her life, leaving Cora to fend for herself until she’s offered refuge by an aunt in Ireland. Here begins Cora’s own journey of rediscovery amid a family history she barely knows.

The novel also dives deep into the lives of two sisters, Maire and Roisin, living on a dairy farm in Ireland years earlier. The sisters’ bond is complex, defined by rivalry, betrayal, and love, especially after Michael—a man who brings both passion and tragedy—enters their lives. The narrative weaves through the present and the past, tracing how choices made on that farm continue to ripple into Cora’s life decades later.

While Airey’s prose beautifully captures the emotional weight of generational trauma and the sacrifices women make, the structure might throw some readers off. The novel frequently jumps timelines, a format that divides opinion. For some, the back-and-forth adds layers to the narrative, connecting characters across time and space. For others, the narrative switches—some spanning 70-page chunks—may disrupt the flow. There’s also a unique second-person point-of-view segment, an ambitious stylistic choice that might feel disorienting but serves a specific narrative purpose.

Overall, Confessions is an impressive debut that will resonate with readers who love nuanced, character-driven stories about flawed women and family secrets. Airey’s writing is thoughtful and immersive, although the fragmented structure may feel challenging to some. Despite these shifts, Confessions remains a haunting, beautifully written exploration of the cost of family loyalty and the resilience required to face one’s past.

What a stunner of a debut novel! I would describe this as something of a coming of age novel, literary fiction and generational trauma. The writing was excellent, I felt very connected with every characters. This was told from many timelines, and multiple POV's, all interconnected to build the story. We travel from New York to Ireland and back, beginning in the September 2001 with Cora in New York City; a New York City currently papered in missing persons posters. Cora's father is one of the missing, her mother long gone. Cora is a minor and makes do for a month after, when she hears from an aunt in Ireland, offering her a new life. This story is also about two sisters in Ireland, torn apart by circumstances, by love, and by death. Roisin, pronounced Ro-sheen; and Maire, pronounced Moira, live on a dairy farm in Ireland, when Michael enters their orbit. Maire is an incredible artist, but Michael and Maire's younger sister Roisin, conspire to get Maire admitted to a program called "The Screamers" in Ireland that ultimately leads Maire to the Big Apple. There are injustices in this book that were so common to the settings/years for some of the characters, and they bring sadness and rage at the same time.