BEFORE MY ACTUAL HEART BREAKS
by Tish Delaney (Hutchinson £14.99, 384 pp)
Mary Rattigan dreams of escaping her toxic family background in Northern Ireland to seek her fortune in the U.S. But accidentally becoming pregnant at 16 puts paid to all that. Instead, a hasty wedding is arranged to handsome local farmer, John Johns.
Despite not being the father of Mary s daughter, John dotes on the child. His relationship with Mary, though, is fraught with problems and the pair live in a state of near estrangement.
Mary is an eloquent narrator, conveying her and her husband s pain with exquisite and moving precision. The loneliness, grief and long-lasting repercussions of trauma are achingly real.