NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR BY THE WASHINGTON POST
SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTION
"Brilliant, beautiful, heartbreaking."--J.Courtney Sullivan, New York
Times Book Review
"*TRESPASSES vaults Kennedy into the ranks of such contemporary
masters as McCann, Claire Keegan, Colin Barrett, and fellow Sligo
resident, Kevin Barry." --Oprah Daily*
Set in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, a shattering novel about a
young woman caught between allegiance to community and a dangerous
passion.
Amid daily reports of violence, Cushla lives a quiet life with her
mother in a small town near Belfast. By day she teaches at a parochial
school; at night she fills in at her family's pub. There she meets
Michael Agnew, a barrister who's made a name for himself defending IRA
members. Against her better judgment - Michael is not only Protestant
but older, and married - Cushla lets herself get drawn in by him and his
sophisticated world, and an affair ignites. Then the father of a student
is savagely beaten, setting in motion a chain reaction that will
threaten everything, and everyone, Cushla most wants to protect.
As tender as it is unflinching, Trespasses is a heart-pounding,
heart-rending drama of thwarted love and irreconcilable loyalties, in a
place what you come from seems to count more than what you do, or whom
you cherish.
