Orchard Street, Dawn

by Joseph O'Connor

An original story from Joseph O’Connor, author of the #1 bestseller in Ireland, Ghost Light, a fictionalized account of the bittersweet love affair between the famously tortured playwright J.M Synge and Molly Allgood, a talented young actress from Dublin's inner city tenements.

Genres: Ebooks, Historical Fiction, Ireland, Short Stories

31 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 27, 2012

About the author

There is more than one author with this name

Joseph O’Connor was born in Dublin. He is the author of the novels Cowboys and Indians (short-listed for the Whitbread Prize), Desperadoes , The Salesman , Inishowen , Star of the Sea and Redemption Falls , as well as a number of bestselling works of non-fiction.

He was recently voted ‘Irish Writer of the Decade’ by the readers of Hot Press magazine. He broadcasts a popular weekly radio diary on RTE’s Drivetime With Mary Wilson and writes regularly for The Guardian Review and The Sunday Independent. In 2009 he was the Harman Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at Baruch College, the City University of New York.

Reviews

[SheLove2Read]

This is a short, 30 page story about a young Irish immigrant family in New York City in the 1870s/1880s. A time and place that is unique in it's own ways. It depicts the relationship between characters, between ethnicities and between races in the savage underbelly. Tenement life was not living. Abject poor scraping by literally hour to hour in a fight for survival, and those conditions were better than what they left in Ireland. Shocking.

To say this was a good story would not right, because it's filled with sadness, but it does take the reader back in time to a city that was brutal yet on the cusp of greatness.

[Matthew]

Very touching story about a young Irish immigrant couple who travel separately to New York City in the late 19th century seeking a chance to have something better. They meet, build a family, and carry each other through heartbreaks and hardships. She dies young, a mother of many children, a few of whom she outlives. He dies alone many years later, still haunted by those pains inflicted so long ago.

[Donadee's Corner]

This was a very interesting short story. The story line is one which not many authors could handle and keep the reader to the last page. To say that I enjoyed it would be wrong, but to say that I was amazed with it would be just right. The heart felt sadness, discouragement and death in one family is unbelieveable. These are the stories that no one has really written like this before. I look forward to more of Mr. O'Connors books. You will to after you read this one!

4/22/12

[Julia Bell]

This was a well written portrait of an immigrant family in America in the 19th century. Parts of the story were very moving. While I know it is meant to be a short story, I do feel the story was too rushed. I didn't need to read a novel of the family's whole life, but I do think there were parts that could have been better fleshed out. A nice free read.

[Dee Renee Chesnut]

This was a free book from BN.com, and it comes with an exceprt from Joseph O'Connor's #1 best seller in Ireland, Ghost Light.
This story of Irish immigrants who live in New York City, and he makes each word count in a memorable way.
I recommend it to all. for those who don't think they have enough time: it can be read in one sitting.

[Dermot Davis]

Lovely written novella capturing a time and period we mostly have forgotten about. The depictions of the families and the people of the time comes across as being so true and so real that you can almost smell the air and feel the dirt beneath their boots.

[Brandi]

This was a very short read. It is about a couple who have come from overseas to live in the 1800's. They have the basic struggles of immigrated people and find that the family that they wanted so bad might not be able to happen.

[jessica]

[free nook book]

[Kristina Arnold]

Heartbreaking and sad but beautifully written.

[Jamie]

To sad for me.