Hans-Christian Oeser

Ireland 1922, in the midst of civil war: IRA fighters bring a dead comrade to the cemetery in Sligo at night. The cemetery keeper is supposed to bury him. Roseanne, his beautiful daughter, is sent for the priest - and a fateful destiny begins to unfold. Years later, Roseanne McNulty recounts how the events of a single night destroyed a family caught between all fronts. She is nearly a hundred years old and has long been a resident of a psychiatric institution when she writes down her memories. Her doctor, Dr. Grene, wants to know more about Roseanne's life than what their hesitant conversations and the few records reveal. What he discovers casts a completely different light on Roseanne's past. Was her beloved father truly a traitor? And is she a child murderer? Sebastian Barry's award-winning novel tells the story of ordinary people caught in the machinery of history. It allows us to experience a time when friends become enemies and neighbors become murderers, when happiness is a rare coin and love is a risk.