She wished that Rosella and Larry were coming now and not weeks away. She wished her mother would let her talk about them. But she barely let herself think about what she wished for most — that she were not in her mother’s living room trying to write a letter, hearing her mother move with difficulty in the room upstairs, but rather at home, waking to the soft light of early summer that appeared through the curtains of her bedroom on Long Island.
I hadn’t previously read Colm Tóibín’s hugely popular Brooklyn (although I thought I had), but even so, there’s enough backstory recapped in Long Island that I was never lost or confused; it’s just that straightforward. Mostly plot-forward, Tóibín isn’t heavy on dialogue or setting (I love an Irish storyteller, but this could have honestly been set anywhere), and the characters are for the most part self-interested and unlikeable, keeping secrets, telling lies, and always running other people’s statements through their minds trying to see what kind of game they’re playing (and while there might be the shine of truth in that — especially when dealing with difficult family members — it makes for exhausting reading.) As a story, I thought this was fine: I assume it’s a bridging step between Brooklyn and the conclusion of Eilis Lacey’s adventures, and while the middle of a trilogy is often underwhelming, I spent a few pleasant hours with this book without ultimately leaving impressed. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final forms.)
When the doorbell rang, Eilis stood up lazily, presuming that it was one of Larry’s cousins calling for him to come and play. However, from the hallway, she made out the silhouette of a grown man through the frosted glass of the door. Until he called out her name, it did not occur to her that this was the man Francesca had mentioned. She opened the door.
‘You are Eilis Fiorello?’
The accent was Irish, with a trace, she thought, of Donegal, like a teacher she had had in school. Also, the way the man stood there, as though waiting to be challenged, reminded her of home.
Set twenty years after the end of Brooklyn, Eilis lives with her husband, Tony, and their teenage children, Rosella and Larry, on a quite cul-de-sac whose only other residents are Tony’s extended Italian family; the matriarch Francesca watching and controlling everything from behind her kitchen’s cafe curtains. When a man comes to Eilis’ door to deliver life-changing news, Francesca arranges a response behind the scenes that sidelines Eilis’ agency, so she decides to grasp some power over her life and spend the summer back home in Ireland, taking the kids with her. Once back in the village of Enniscorthy — and in the home of her own watching and controlling mother — Eilis mostly avoids the gossip-mongering locals (everyone is whispering about how she can afford a fancy rental car for weeks, she’s not going to let them know about her troubles back home), and when she does run into old friends, Eilis is careful not to share too much (which leads to Eilis’ insouciant disruption of other people’s lives, as her own had been disrupted.) The questions unasked and unanswered, the omissions and lies, gossip and game-playing — Eilis is just one of many characters with hidden agendas and their interactions were consistently frustrating:
Eilis appeared puzzled, as though she hadn’t heard him properly. But he knew not to repeat the question; instead, he should give her time to take it in. He kept his eyes on her and let the silence linger. She didn’t move at all. He wondered if she was thinking about something else or if she was working out how to reply. He began to count the seconds as they went by, until he got to a hundred and then two hundred. He could feel that his own face was burned from the midday sun at Cush. But Eilis’s colour had not changed. She was pale. She looked around the room and then directly at him. He sensed that his question still hung in the air and then it became obvious that she wasn’t going to answer it.
Again: I understand that this is a middle volume of the “Eilis Lacey Series”, and without having read the first volume, I didn’t get the pleasure of catching up with beloved old characters, so my underwhelmed response is only to Long Island as a standalone. I will say: if the next volume promises a clash of titans between Francesca Fiorello and Mrs Lacey, as hinted at in this book’s ending, I wouldn’t miss it.
