The Stolen Child

An American woman with a troubled past arrives on a tiny island off Ireland to claim her inheritance: a small cottage in a tight-knit, secretive community with its own demons - and fairies. Brigid seeks solace, solitude and a miracle in her mother's birthplace. But will the same demons that drove her mother away also chase off Brigid? Her hopes of solitude are cut short by strange, angry Emer and her day-dreaming son Niall, who all become close in spite of themselves.

This is a book that I wanted very much to like from the premise. And for the most part I was won over by Carey's moody descriptions of the island and its people, the private passions and deep terrors they contain. It took me time to forgive the jarring over-explaining of show more just how and how much of an outsider Brigid is -- a feeling I have experienced and which is altogether more subtle than she captures with some pretty broad stereotyping on both sides. But forgive I did for the rest of the story which grabbed me and got me reading again, after a long time away. show less

This book sounded so good: beautiful setting, Irish mythology, man vs nature...

Two of the main characters are a set of Irish twin sisters: one friendly and likable, the other her opposite. Add to it an American and a gaggle of children. Despite eveything the author told us about the women, they didn't feel real to me. I just couldn't seem to care about them. Emer, the unlikable one who had the power to make people around her miserable, reminded me of someone I used to know, which may have colored my feelings towards her. But even the others couldn't hold my attention.

I thought the writing was good, the descriptions made the island come to life in my mind. There are two quotes that really stuck with me, the best one being on page 293: show more "It's like being kicked in the stomach, the truth, even when you suspect it."

Overall the book did not feel like a chore, but I got no satisfaction from having finished it. Maybe Emer's power to bring misery translated through the pages into this reader. show less

This book has everything I desire in a book and a few things I didn't know I wanted:

First, the language and visuals are utterly gorgeous. Richly drawn setting, dark and nuanced feelings, so much visceral, bodily action. In practically every paragraph I marked the margins for a sentence that absolutely stunned me.

Second, the novel is populated with a net of strong, complex women. Yes, this book passes the Bechdel test and then some. So many different balances of power between the women to shift and surprise you over the course of the book.

Third, the history behind the secluded island community that drives the story here is so intriguing. I found myself so worked up about knowing the'd have to leave the island (it's revealed in the show more prologue), that I sometimes had to step away. It seemed so hard to imagine how they'd continue to exist without the energy of the island beneath their feet, so alive is Carey's sense of place.

Fourth, the plot is absolutely riveting. Carey does a masterful job of marking time in this book. I missed my bus stop and put off prepping for classes and asked a friend with whom I was sharing a hotel room to wait just a minute (that ended up being many more) before talking to me while I finished a section. This is where the element of being introduced to something unexpected comes in, too. I had not been one to pick up a book that touted mystical powers or fairies as major elements of the story, but this book showed me I should not be so closed-minded. In Carey's hands, those details are handled with such grace and proficiency and deepen the meaning and resonance of the story so much that I felt willing to trust in a way I hadn't before, and the payoff is truly worth that trust.

I'm so eager to dive into Carey's back catalog now, and so grateful this book came to me at the time it did. I recommend it highly. show less

I really enjoyed this book centered around two women in a remote Irish island in the late 1950s. I'm a big fan of Ireland and Celtic myth, and loved both the story of life on those islands and the interweaving of fairy lore and magic and the saint/goddess Brigid into the tale. I wasn't expecting as many faery/magic/magical realism elements as I found, and loved them all the more for the surprise.

I thought the writing was excellent and the slow unfolding of the characters' back stories intermixed with the present day of the story really added to how the tale unfolded. The characters and their wishes and goals and lives were complex and well-rounded.

As a lesbian, I liked the relationship between two women that emerged, in a way that felt show more true for the characters involved and the time and place, but was also remarkable to my modern eye for its complete lack of a sense of queer identity.

As you might imagine, life on a remote Irish island was not easy. Trigger warning for some domestic violence and sexual violence. If that's not a deal-breaker, it's highly recommended. show less

Because I once lived on the western coast of Ireland, and because author Lisa Cary moved to the island of Inishbofin, off Ireland's west coast to research her first book, I've been following her career for many years. I've loved each of her four Irish themed novels, and eagerly awaited the February 7th release of her latest, The Stolen Child. It is a story much like Ireland herself: deceptive in its riddled nuances, more than the sum of its parts. The soul of the story creeps up on you. It takes patience and willingness to allow the magic to take hold, and when it does, it is not by possession. The Stolen Child spins the kind of magic that lulls at the core of your being; affects your consciousness, waits for you to piece it together show more until you understand. There is little overt in this languid novel, which, again, is much like Ireland. It is a desperate story through and through, yet in the hands of author Lisa Carey, it resonates with mythical beauty, gives you a sense of timelessness, and holds you fast by its earthy, brass tacks.
In pitch-perfect language, Carey wields dialogue specific to the west coast of Ireland’s desolate environs. It is an understated language, upside down to outsiders, but once your ear attunes, you are affronted by the superfluousness of other tongues. All primary characters in The Stolen Child are women. They live cut-off from the mainland of Ireland’s west coast, twelve miles out, upon rocky, wind-swept, St. Brigid’s Island, during the one year time frame of May, 1959 to May, 1960. It is a timeframe fraught with the looming inevitability of the islanders’ evacuation from their homeland, with its generational customs and ties, to the stark reality of life on the mainland, with its glaring and soulless “mod-cons.” Most of the characters are conflicted about leaving the island, save for the sinister Emer, who has her own selfish agenda, centered upon her only child Niall. Her sister, Rose, is the sunny, earth-mother, unflappable sort, who only sees the buried good in Emer, whereas everyone one else on the island shuns her, for her malefic, dark ways, which they intuit as dark art. Emer has one foot on the island and the other in the recesses of the fairies’ manipulative underworld. It is the American “blow-in,” Brigid, the woman with a complicated past, who has her own ties to the island from her banished mother, that cracks the carapace of Emer’s guarded and angry countenance. Together, the pair explore an illicit relationship, but when it snaps back, Emer retaliates with a force that effects the entire island and twists her worst fears into fate.
The Stolen Child is magnificently crafted, for it is a sweeping story set on a cloistered island, which has nothing to recommend it save for its quays, its view, and its eponymous holy-well. This is a novel rife with character study that is quintessentially Irish, yet applicable far afield. In themes of motherhood, hope, desperation, and hopelessness, the characters take what little they have and wrestle it into making do. It is the power of steel intention that drives this story, and the reader receives it from all conceivable angles. I recommend The Stolen Child to all who love Ireland, to all who love an exceptional, creative story, and to all who love language used at its finest. All praise to the author Lisa Carey. I eagerly await the next book. show less

Set in the middle of the 20th Century on a small Irish island, where time seems to have moved more slowly than on the mainland, life is unsettled by the arrival of the Yank. Brigid has returned to her family's land from the States in search for a miracle from her saintly namesake. The islanders treat her with suspicion at the start, talking around her in Gaelic and initially keeping her distance, both because Brigid is an incomer and because of her own family's reputation. Emer is the first to come round, a bitter woman who has grown twisted in the shadow of her beautiful and beloved twin, Rose. Brigid has a gift, but using it has come at great personal cost.
I enjoyed the magical elements of the book, the faeries and changelings, as show more well as the richly drawn female characters. Carey portrays well the insular nature of the islanders, suspicious of change, but also wary of outsiders and those who are different.
The book draws you in, I thought it would be a much lighter read at the start, but Carey builds tension by highlighting the grey areas of life. The ending was a little abrupt, but I am not sure it could have ended any differently.
I would recommend this for a cold day, just curl up with a coffee and the book, or for a group read as there are lots of points to be discussed. show less

I was pleasantly surprised how good this book was!
Emer reminded me of my Mom, which really left me feeling like "This poor woman, suffering with such mental illness to believe in fairies!" ... but ... wow!
And the sort of lesbian love story in the middle was not distracting or offensive at all. It did add to the story.

Adrianne