Another Kind of Life
By Catherine Dunne
November 2003
Picador
ISBN: 0330427334
483 pages, Illustrated, 4 ¼" x 7"
$19.95 Paper Original
An absorbing and perceptive novel of a country stirred by the divides of religion, poverty and politics and of five very different young women. Three sisters, Hannah, May and Eleanor, know nothing but a comfortable, middle-class life in Dublin until the sound of arguing is heard one evening and their father disappears. From then on, there are changes: the children are taken to Belfast to live with their grandfather where they discover their own individuality - their love towards one another binds them together, but a new self-awareness comes to the fore.
For Hannah, always the caring, protective, and talented elder sister, there is a realisation that life is not always predictable and plans can crumble; for May, there is the discovery of the dusty books lining her grandfather's library and the world that they describe; for Eleanor, a growing perception of her unusualness, of her extraordinary ability to understand an adult world from a remove. In another part of the country, two other sisters find their world changing: Maria and Cecilia are born into a working-class Belfast family, one soon torn apart by poverty and disease. When they find themselves alone, they have to decide whether to accept the lot that was their parents, or to move on and discover a new life elsewhere.
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