Echoes (original 1985; edition 2000)

Clare and David - divided as children by a rigid social code that branded her as shanty Irish and he as gentry class...brought together as adults by a passion that couldn't be denied. It was a desire that knew no class, no barriers, only the urgent hunger of two people destined to love and ready to defy any convention used by a world determined to keep them apart.

Even at fifteen, David Power knew eleven-year-old Clare O'Brien's dearest wish, to win a school prize. But it was years before Dr. Power's cherished only son recognized in the huckster's daughter his own heart's desire. Here in Castlebay, perched precariously on the seaside cliffs, the lines between them were clearly drawn.

Clare's only hope is to leave the town where time stopped, propelled by scholarships to Dublin, fueled by her own drive and brilliance, far from the insular, gossipy world of Castlebay and those held in its thrall...Angela O'Hara - beautiful, insolated, a teacher trapped in the convent school, who risks everything to help Clare escape...Gerry Doyle, the town charmer who finds in Clare the woman he vows to have at any price...Caroline Nolan, the beautiful, rich outsider who comes to plunder.

For Clare, that was before the wild freedom of Dublin, and love. And David. Before fate drove them back to Castlebay, and the past. I truly enjoyed this book, as I usually do with any book by Maeve Binchy that I read. Reading Maeve Binchy's books, even rereading some of them, as this particular book Echoes was for me, is almost like returning to familiar places and visiting old but very familiar friends. I read Echoes for the first time maybe a decade to fifteen years ago and enjoyed this book then as well. I give this book an A+! and have placed it on my keeper bookshelf to enjoy again at some point in the very near future! ( )

This Binchy book didn't grab my attention like most of her others, and I didn't really get all that interested in either the plot or the characters until about halfway through. The novel tells the story of young, ambitious Clare O'Brien, who works extraordinarily hard to escape her home-town, only to return several years later under different circumstances. ( )

Not one of my favourite Maeve Binchy novels. The story was quite easy to follow, and it had the usual gossipy Irish/Catholic content. I was gutted by the things that happen to Claire in the first half of the book, but somehow my sympathy dissipated as the plot meandered through the second half and seemed to get a bit lost. Maeve Binchy's later novels are a lot more polished. ( )

I can't believe there was a Maeve Binchy book I missed. And since this was one of her older novels, it was much better than her recent books, with the deep character development so inherent in her earlier works. Now, I want to reread some of her other earlier works that have been hiding on my shelf. ( )

It was slightly different from her usual style of typical expected ending but i liked it. Her characters came alive and it was all in all a good summer read ( )