Small Things Like These: Shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2022

Small Things Like These is a really powerful and thought-provoking book. It's set in Ireland in the 1980s and tells the story of a man who discovers a secret that could change his life forever. The writing is beautiful and the characters are really well-developed. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys historical fiction.

A short novel/novella. 124 pages. The first half is a slow and gentle introduction to the place, the people and a hint of the future. The second half is a slow and contemplative following of Bill's journey. The end is perfect. And it's timely in more than one way. Bought three more as gifts. An evening better spent than watching shouty people in a dysfunctional street/square. Better spent than watching/listening to celebs of very doubtful talent taking time off from selfies There ya go. Mr grumpy strikes. My best purchase this season apart from a delicious Manor House cake.

Small Things Like These is a poignant and quietly powerful tale of courage, compassion, standing up for what we know to be right, and raising one's voice, even if it quavers, in the face of powerful institutional pressure to turn away. It's the lead-up to Christmas 1985 in the Irish town where Bill Furlong lives with his wife and five daughters. While many in the community are suffering from the effects of a struggling economy, the Furlong family are comparatively comfortable, thanks to their thriving wood and coal supply business. Tender-hearted Bill often extends charity to those who are struggling to make ends meet, especially with the cold winter closing in. In the course of his work, Bill makes delivery to the local Catholic convent, associated with both a home for single mothers, a commercial laundry staffed by those women and the private school his own daughters attend. On one such visit, he discovers a shivering teenage girl locked within the coal storage hutch. Bill frees the girl and escorts her to the Convent's Mother Superior, but is troubled by the undercurrents he feels and the girl's entreaties for him to find out what has happened to her baby. Bill feels echoes from his own personal history, as his own mother found herself "in trouble" when she fell pregnant with him, but was fortunate to be taken in by her employer, Miss Wilson, rather than exiled to the home for single mothers. Bill feels compelled to "pay forward" his own early good fortune by reaching out to the young woman. Despite several warnings he receives from townsfolk, and his own wife's suggestion that he would be wise to turn a blind eye to what goes on at the convent, Bill finds the courage to stand by his moral convictions, despite facing the ire of the all-powerful Catholic church. Exploring the horrifying history of the Magdalen Laundries and other systemic abuses carried out by the Catholic church in Ireland (which are echoed worldwide), Claire Keegan weaves a rather beautiful narrative against an ugly and troubling backdrop. It's an unusual premise for a Christmas fable, but it works. I'd highly recommend Small Things Like These as a short but meaningful read, which will be appreciated by readers who are fascinated by personal stories and thought-provoking scenarios. I'll be adding a copy to my own small collection of Christmas classics, to be brought out and savoured every year during Advent.