The notorious Magdalen Laundries in Ireland were run by Catholic nuns with the blessing of the institutional church and state. The laundries were supposedly reforming "problem" girls and women — unwed mothers, women in trouble with the law, girls whose families didn't want them — by forcing them to do unpaid work. Unwed mothers had their babies given up for adoption.
In Small Things Like These, a town in 1985 Ireland turns its eyes away from its asylum. But once coal and lumber merchant Bill Furlough becomes aware of the laundry, he can't look away. He might have ended up in a laundry if a wealthy Protestant widow hadn't sheltered him and his unwed mother. Now, with a wife and five daughters, Furlough can't afford to jeopardize his financial standing, but he has the inmates on his conscience.
Furlough's decisive act of courage happens at Christmastime in this short book by celebrated Irish writer Claire Keegan.
Home
My reviews
My friends'
reviews