Firefly Summer

A saga. This is a saga of a family, of several families, of a town. Mountfern, Ireland is a sleepy, rural community. In the summer of 1962, the wealthy American Patrick O'Neill arrives in Mountfern trying to reconnect with his ancestral roots. He purchases the old O'Neill homestead and plans to develop it into a hotel. At the center of the story is the Ryan family; their pub stands to be rendered obsolete by the new O'Neill hotel. Over the next five years the entire village is changed by the O'Neill venture, none more so than the Ryans.

This is early Binchy, and the book is remarkable in its scope and scale. There are many characters and many strands of narrative. It has the Binchy touches of tone that will be familiar to her regular show more readers. The book took some time to get started. It took me some time to get invested, which I haven't found to be an issue in other Binchy works. I appreciated Binchy's willingness to take on what must seem to many Irish people as the absurdity of Americans coming back to "claim" their Irish heritage and expecting to be welcomed with open arms. Ultimately this book requires an investment of time. It's not the best example of Binchy's work, but it does serve the sort of comfort-read purposes that many find in Binchy. show less

Maeve Binchy never disappoints, I enjoyed this book. ‘Firefly Summer’ keeps the reader engaged with the quotidian but never dull lives of Irish village life in the 1960’s.
The village in this book is Mountfern, which sits alongside the river Fern. On one side of the river lay the ruins of Fernscourt, a mansion in its day. Patrick O’Neill (a wealthy Irish American), purchases Fernscourt (unseen) and arrives at Mountfern to rebuild his ancestral roots and Fernscourt into its former glory to entertain his wealthy American acquaintances. Patrick O’Neill is a likeable person who has dreamed of returning to his roots for many years, although most of his friends advise against it. His grand plans for its development threaten to show more shatter the peace. A new luxury hotel promises to breathe new life into the village, and yet it could spell disaster for the locals and in particular the Ryan family, alongside Patrick O’Neill and his family.
As old values and traditions begin to crumble away, no-one - not even Patrick - can predict what his big dreams will do to the heart of their quiet village.
There is a large cast of local characters, and it wasn’t a problem to remember them throughout the story. When one of them is significant to the story, their context is subtly shown. A few stand out: Rachel Fine, Patrick’s colleague and mistress from the United States, a very likeable person.
Sheila Whelan, the postmistress, observes everything that is going on, and is both understanding and discreet.
Fergus Slattery, the solicitor, secretly in love with Kate Ryan, a bit disorganised, single-minded but loyal.
The main characters are the Ryan family who own the pub on the other side of the ruins of Fernscourt. John Ryan and his wife Kate, their four children. Twins Dara and Michael (aged 12 at the start of the novel), the reader is made aware of all the pubertal emotions and anguish as they age through the storyline. They have two younger brothers, Eddie who seems to be attracted to mischief and adventure, and his much more nervous, fearful brother Declan.

Dara and Michael have a group of friends around their age, and spend a lot of their time playing in the ruins of the old, ruined Fernscourt mansion. Patrick O’Neill, has a son, fifteen-year-old Kerry, who is cynical and devious, and a beautiful 12-year-old daughter, Grace, who is charming, friendly and kind. As a reader Grace is too nice, too prissy, too perfect.

There are some shocks in the story, events that have many repercussions. People’s lives change forever, and although Patrick is not necessarily held responsible, he knows that if he hadn’t arrived, following his dream, life might have continued without some of the tragedies that occur. show less

I think every time I read a Maeve Binchy book I have a new favorite. Well, not quite. But this definitely ranks high on my list of favorites of her books. The cast of characters is miles long and by the fourth chapter you feel like you've known them all your life; the story is just complicated enough and with enough twists to keep it interesting without feeling too contrived. The driving strength in most of Binchy's books is, for me, the dialogue. Nobody writes it like she does, so naturally and with just enough of an Irish sound to it to make it seem quirky to my American ears, without being overdone. The interactions between her characters, and her characters themselves, are so real that the strange circumstances in which they will show more always find themselves as long as she is writing about them seem as familiar to me as my own life does. show less

Firefly Summer is another early Binchy, her third, and is set in an Irish village facing change as an Irish-American business man returns to his ancestral homes with plans for a resort that may or may not help the villagers. Within its larger theme of change are the stories of the people themselves and Binchy creates a bittersweet world for villagers and visiters alike.

Well-written and warm, with just the right amount of conversation for my tastes. No high action, but it certainly isn't dull. There's just enough description to give me a vague picture of the place, but not so much that I started to skim.

There are a few dramatic shocks along the way, which I had totally forgotten about since my previous reading of this book. Somehow, though, I wasn't deeply emotionally moved. But it's a thought-provoking novel, nonetheless, and an excellent picture of a small town in Ireland in the 1960s. A wealthy Irish-American businessman is the catalyst for all kinds of changes.

Longer review here: https://suesbookreviews.blogspot.com/2024/02/firefly-summer-by-maeve-binchy.html

I seem to be having issues with really getting into Maeve Binchy's earliest works. This one, "Firefly Summer" went on forever. There were way too many characters to keep track of, lack of character development though some characters reach epiphanies, an overall plot, and several side plots, and an abrupt ending to the whole thing.

Starting in 1962, the main focus of "Firefly Summer" is the Ryan family living in the Irish village of Mountfern. Parents John and Kate have five children (Twins Dara and Michael, Eddie and Declan) and are doing their best running their family owned pub. Things change for the family and village when American Patrick O'Neil decides to build a hotel in Mountfern. Due to the hotel being built, it is going to show more directly impact a lot of businesses, especially the Ryan pub which is going to have to deal with a loss of customers. Patrick has two children named Grace and Kerry who also end up impacting the Ryan family in a lot of ways as well.

There are so many other primary (Patrick O'Neil's hidden mistress/girlfriend Rachel Fine) and secondary characters (the Ryan's live in help Carrie) I would be here all day listing them out. Honestly I wish that the book had just stuck with the Ryan family and their POV throughout the book. Instead we get everyone's POV in this book and the whole thing feels so jumbled. I also kept getting people mixed up here and there, but just went with it because I wasn't in the mood to go back and re-read where they first got introduced.

I will say that my favorite characters in this would be Kate Ryan and Rachel Fine. I loved their friendship and thought it was interesting that Ms. Binchy would include a Jewish character in her book in order to showcase how America in the 1960s was prejudiced against those of a different religious background than Catholic.

Kate Ryan was definitely the heart of this story for me. She loves her family and wants to do everything she can to see them all safe and happy. When an accident happens that impacts her family you get to see how the village pulls together to take care of one of their own.

Rachel Fine I found to be a complex character who I really wanted to tell her to just be done with Patrick O'Neil. Rachel has put up with not being able to really be with Patrick like she wants because she has to deal with knowing her religion keeps Patrick from being officially "seen" with her as anything but her boss. Towards the end of the book we get Rachel finally seeing Patrick as he is and she realizes that she needs to move on. Of course it took like another 100 pages before she did.

I have to say the characters I found the most frustrating were the Ryan twins. I thought they were both beyond self absorbed and obsessed with Grace and Kerry O'Neil respectively. It just got beyond boring for me to keep reading about teenage love when there were so many other side plots going on. Anytime we switched to Dara and her obsessing over Kerry the book dragged. Same issue with Michael and Grace.

The writing is not typical Binchy to me. This whole book felt very long-winded. I like her later novels and short stories when she can tell you so much in just a few short words. Everything in this book felt over explained and described.

The flow was terrible. An event would be brought up and we would get six people's POV on it. The whole book just lumbered until we got almost to the end.

The setting of Mountfern didn't really come alive for me in this book like in previous Binchy novels. I would be able to tell you about all of the people, places in her other books and this one I am still confused on the layout of the town and other people's homes.

The ending was abrupt and the whole book comes to just a stop. I wish there had been an epilogue or something. After trudging through 600 plus pages I felt cheated that we really don't get an idea of what happened to characters. I can guess, but it be nice to have it confirmed. show less

Mountfern

This is the story of a small village in the Midlands of Ireland called Mountfern. Patrick O'Neill decides to return to ireland, to mounted where his father was from, but the old house Fernscourt, where his father was a servant and was kicked out, and make it a hotel. It takes five years or so to get the hotel built with many problems and tragedies over the years. The day of the opening of the hotel, tragedy strikes again. Really enjoyed this book. Maeve Binchy is a wonderful writer and I love her books.