We are honored to host Colm Tóibín on the publication day of his riveting novel Long Island, which continues the story of Eilis Fiorello (née Lacey). The critically acclaimed and bestselling Brooklyn chronicled Eilis’ move from her native Ireland to the US in the 1950s, and introduced us to a heroine whose inner life is just as complex as her external journey of migration and acculturation.
Now in her forties, Eilis’s comfortable life on Long Island is upended by stunning news about her husband, Tony. Though she has not returned to Ireland in decades, the revelation sets Eilis toward County Wexford once again: back to the town—and the people—she chose to leave behind.
Did Eilis make the wrong choice marrying Tony all those years ago? Is it too late now to take a different path?
Long Island is about longings unfulfilled, even unrecognized. The silences in the characters’ lives are thunderous and dangerous, and there’s no one more deft than Tóibín at giving them language. This is a gorgeous story of a woman alone in a marriage and the deepest bonds she rekindles.
About Colm Tóibín
Colm Tóibín is the author of eleven novels, including Long Island; The Magician, winner of the Rathbones Folio Prize; The Master, winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; Brooklyn, winner of the Costa Book Award; The Testament of Mary; and Nora Webster; as well as two story collections and several books of criticism. He is the Irene and Sidney B. Silverman Professor of the Humanities at Columbia University and has been named as the Laureate for Irish Fiction for 2022–2024 by the Arts Council of Ireland. Three times shortlisted for the Booker Prize, Tóibín lives in Dublin and New York.
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