Customer Reviews

Moira's Crossing: A Novel

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Moira's Crossing is a fine first novel told from the perspective of two sisters who emigrate from Ireland to the U.S. in the late 1920s. It details their hardships and tragedy in Ireland and their making a new home in New England, finding husbands, living through W.W.II, and finally making peace with their past. The book is one that emphasizes domesticity among hardships, religious faith intertwined with doubt, family togetherness along with family disputes, happiness and sorrow, and pride and shame. In short, it captures the multi-faceted life Irish immigrants found in the New World in the 20th Century. An excellent read!

With haunting and luminous prose, as well as carefully chosen situtations and cultural details, Shea captures the essence of "Irish silence" that haunts two sisters over their lifetimes. She has a magnificant ear for prose rhythm, dialogue and accent, and relationships. The plot is utterly fascinating.

If good storytelling is what you look for in fiction, this one's for you. You will care about Moira, her sister, their father, while witnessing Irish American history during the worn torn 40's through the 70s. This would be an excellent Oprah pick.

It's not often that you read a work of fiction that delivers such a satisfyingly rich and complex story without making a lot of loud noise doing so. This book reaches those heights. It is a fine literary work. The plot is genuine, not contrived; no unnecessary calamities to con the reader. The characters are real multi-dimensional human beings, not caricatures. Bravo, Ms. Shea! I can't wait for your next book.

After reading The Poisonwood Bible and being so involved with the family in that novel, I thought Moira's Crossing would be along the same lines. While I really got into the book and couldn't put it down (it took me only 3 days to read this book in the little spare time I have), I felt like some of the characters were not developed enough so I didn't really feel anything for them. Plus, when I got to the end (and if it's a really good book, I want to get to the end as soon as possible and then when it's over, I'm sad it's over because I will miss the characters), all I thought was "huh?" And I must have missed the point somewhere -- what WAS Moira's Crossing?

Smart & subtle writing, generous and warm without being sentimental. Basically the tale of two sisters and their voyage from Ireland to America. Wonderfully divergent personalities. Moira is tough, enigmatic, brave; Julia is a pious hypochondriac. They live together, in a succession of different houses, year after year, decade after decade, both of them in love, more or less, with the same man...

Moira's Crossing is a perfectly written novel of the immigrant experience and the nature of family. The author so immediately involves you in the lives of the characters that you won't be able to put the book down.

Moira's Crossing left me in awe of Shea's lyrical prose and ability to draw out complicated emotions without overstating them. This book explores the complicated nature of sisterhood in a quiet, careful way. It does not hit the reader over the head with its statement. It is a sophisticated read, a powerful depiction of family troubles, and ultimately it is a book about redemption and resolution. Readers expecting an easy, obvious read will not necessarily find it here; readers looking for something more subtle (but more powerful)will love Moira's Crossing.

Well written story about two Irish immigrant sisters and how their experiences created distinctively different people. The "sister bond" is beautifully developed as well as the "silence" that quietly exists still today in Irish descendent households (the powerfully unspoken moments). The story is well crafted througout. A strong debut novel!

After reading The Poisonwood Bible and being so involved with the family in that novel, I thought Moira's Crossing would be along the same lines. While I really got into the book and couldn't put it down (it took me only 3 days to read this book in the little spare time I have), I felt like some of the characters were not developed enough so I didn't really feel anything for them. Plus, when I got to the end (and if it's a really good book, I want to get to the end as soon as possible and then when it's over, I'm sad it's over because I will miss the characters), all I thought was "huh?" And I must have missed the point somewhere -- what WAS Moira's Crossing?