An extraordinarily moving and expansive debut novel that follows three generations of women from New York to rural Ireland and back again

It is late September in 2001 and the walls of New York are papered over with photos of the missing. Cora Brady’s father is there, the poster she made taped to columns and bridges. Her mother died long ago and now, orphaned on the cusp of adulthood, Cora is adrift and alone. Soon, a letter will arrive with the offer of a new life- far out on the ragged edge of Ireland, in the town where her parents were young, an estranged aunt can provide a home and fulfil a long-forgotten promise. There the story of her family is hidden, and in her presence will begin to unspool…

An essential, immersive debut from an astonishing new voice, Confessions traces the arc of three generations of women as they experience in their own time the irresistible gravity of the past- its love and tragedy, its mystery and redemption, and, in all things intended and accidental, the beauty and terrible shade of the things we do.

Catherine Airey grew up in England in a family of mixed English-Irish descent, and now lives in County Cork. Confessions is her first novel.