Traces a family line from famine time in Ireland to their settlement in Canada and a few generations beyond. "Away" describes people who have been touched in the head by some other spirit. The book has a dream-like quality to it.

An evocative story. I loved how Irish mythology was weaved into Canadian history. ( )

The body of this novel in its narration is as suspended as the pendulum movement of waves in a body of water, of which the book is gravitationally focused.

It speaks of a history that dates back to 1842 on an island of Rathlin, just off the northern coast of Ireland and moves as its characters move in migration to the area of the Great Lakes in Canada 140 years later. As such, it is both a book of the early politics between the English and the Irish during the Irish famine in the mid 19th century and a book of displacement and yearning, immigration, and the search for home.

But it is also a book that speaks through women of four generations whose astute power to attract men to themselves is both a gift and a family curse much blamed on the dangerous power of beauty found in their pale, white skin against their red, fiery hair.

It is in this beauty that captivated the township of Cleggan, Kinramer, Church Bay, Ballygill, and Ballycarry etc. towards the character, Mary Slattery O'Malley, also renamed Moira, who was believed to be sought and taken "away" by a daemon lover from the sea.

The voice of the book is often written as lyrical fantasy, the language poetic and sentimental, which exemplifies the beauty of not only the landscape of the mind, but its connection to the beauty and glory of Ireland's and Canada's natural landscapes, its rivers and its forests.

As Mary Slattery O'Malley was tied to the shores of Rathlin Island and the women in her family after her: Eileen, to the forests and willow trees near Black River; and Esther, to the surf of Loughbreeze Beach -- the nature of the land is exquisitely portrayed.

The women, though, become hosts of folklore:

Mary, in her withdrawn state and compulsion to imagine and be drawn to the spirit of her deceased beloved from the sea, removes herself both emotionally and physically from her husband and two children.

This same passion is passed down to her daughter, Eileen, whose innocence and creativity, is drawn to sleep in willow trees, to communicate with and have visions and prophecies from nature and conversations with namely a bird. The same power of compulsion drove her to sacrifice a life of material comfort and love alongside her brother, in search for her misplaced beloved, the political vagrant, Aiden Lanighan.

Though Urquhart's writing can be both beautiful and poetic in her descriptions of love and nature, even the sorrowful lament of a community struck by famine, I found the extremism in these women to be obsessive, self-indulgent, and delusional to the point of hysteria.

Personally, I would have preferred the book without its political implications or its irrational bouts of "love-sickness," but enjoyed the language of poetics and folklore told in the love of the landscape, history, and the style of recollection, that Urquhart described.

Aside from that, I found its main female characters too melancholy and over dramatic for reason. I would enjoy the novel alone for its lyrical storytelling and haunting spirituality that resides in its respect and wonder at nature. But it's not a novel I would allow myself to take too seriously. (Unfortunately, it takes more than pale white skin and red, fiery hair to seduce me...)

( )

I am often caught between giving 3 or 4 stars to a book, and wish half stars were an option. In my universe (pun intended) 5 stars is reserved for books that are not only well written and creative but that catch me up emotionally and transport me someplace else while I'm immersed in them. 4 stars are for books that are almost there -- I usually appreciate the writing but don't feel connected enough into the book's world. Three stars are for books that are above average in terms of writing but basically run of the mill -- I put most mysteries and thrillers in this category. Two stars are seriously flawed in my opinion (as a reader) -- I may or may not finish them depending on how interesting I find the subject matter. And I would be unlikely to finish anything I'd rate with 1 star -- life is too short and there are too many other GOOD boos to read.

That said, I would give Away 3.5 stars if I could. Good writing, interesting plot, but I found myself drifting away from the page and having to keep pulling myself back to the story. There were a few chapters that kept my interest and had me hoping I'd end up giving it 4 stars, but in the end they were too few and far between. ( )

co-winner trillium award
shortlisted international dublin literary award
liked the story but not the weird women. is she trying to be gabriel garcia what's his name? i was reading alistair macloud at the same time. preferred him because his women are more realistic. ( )