Description A story of Ireland and Americans, from a master of intelligent, witty comic fiction.
Peggy, who’s Irish, and Charlie, American, have moved from New York to Dublin, paying all they have for a painfully small, old and dilapidated house. “It was Charlie’s brilliant idea to downshift in the first place,” writes Peggy in her diary. “He wanted to retire to Tír na nÓg, the land of youth, and all that. I was happy in old New York with cockroaches and all mod cons.” And now that they’ve arrived Charlie is being pursued by “a sexy, tight-jeaned redhead of about twenty with killer eyelashes... Why is it, when you hit fifty, everyone looks young and beautiful?”
But their troubles really start when their friends from America start to visit. And, of course, it’s Charlie’s fault: “Charlie’s so proud of our new life that he called his stepfather last month: ‘We gotta place, Henry! Come on over.’” So Henry and Rose arrive, only to be followed by a succession of visitors whose time with Peggy and Charlie is marked by cultural, dietary, hygienic, personality and many other clashes. Meanwhile, Peggy and Charlie have their own tensions and conflicts... and the tight-jeaned redhead is still around.
Author Mary Rose Callaghan, author of six previous novels, one play and one biography, is noted for her comic fiction, which is characterised by her “Irish wit...[and] sense of the ridiculous” Library Journal.
She is also the author of many short stories, which have appeared in magazines and anthologies; she teaches courses in Irish fiction and she was assistant editor of The Dictionary of Irish Literature.
