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The All of It: A Novel
Jeannette Haien’s award-winning first novel relates the seemingly simple tale of a parishioner confiding in her priest, but the tangled confession brings secrets to light that provoke a moral quandary for not only the clergyman, but the reader as well. Set in a small town in Ireland, Haien’s intimate novel of conversations and dilemmas—perfect for readers of Paul Harding’s Tinkers, Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead, and Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood—is “an elegantly written, compact and often subtle tale of morality and passion that gives voice to an age-old concern in a fresh way” (New York Times Book Review). Harper Perennial breathes new life into this 1986 classic in a new edition with an introduction by Ann Patchett.
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First published July 1, 1986
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About the author
Jeannette Haien
5 books45 followersAfter more than thirty-five years as a professional concert pianist and music teacher, Jeannette Haien, in her 60s, began her second career as a novelist. Her first novel, The All of It, published in 1986, garnered the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the Academy of Arts and Letters.
Born in Dayton, Ohio, to a Dutch immigrant-industrialist father and a violinist mother, she received a bachelor's degree in English and a masters degree in music from the University of Michigan.
Jeannette performed extensively as a pianist throughout the Midwest before and immediately after her 1948 marriage to Ernest Ballard. In 1950, the Ballards moved to New York City, from then on their permanent home. Pursuing her professional career under her maiden name, Jeannette Haien taught piano privately and, subsequently, as a member of the piano faculty of Mannes College of Music (1969-1991). She toured biennially with the cultural outreach programs of the United States Information Agency in Europe, Asia and Central America throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
Born in Dayton, Ohio, to a Dutch immigrant-industrialist father and a violinist mother, she received a bachelor's degree in English and a masters degree in music from the University of Michigan.
Jeannette performed extensively as a pianist throughout the Midwest before and immediately after her 1948 marriage to Ernest Ballard. In 1950, the Ballards moved to New York City, from then on their permanent home. Pursuing her professional career under her maiden name, Jeannette Haien taught piano privately and, subsequently, as a member of the piano faculty of Mannes College of Music (1969-1991). She toured biennially with the cultural outreach programs of the United States Information Agency in Europe, Asia and Central America throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,011 reviews
December 12, 2023
Perfect for fans of Claire Keegan!
This is a story of Father Declan de Loughry who arrives on the scene shortly before his long-term parishioner dies.
He discovers that the deceased has been keeping a secret for fifty years. But the truth is rarely simple.
The All of It is a very plot-driven novella, 145 pages, set in Ireland and involves the role of religion in society.
A deeply moving tale, a reminder to seek first to understand before being understood.
How much I spent:
Softcover text – Free through Mel-Cat (Michigan Library System)
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This is a story of Father Declan de Loughry who arrives on the scene shortly before his long-term parishioner dies.
He discovers that the deceased has been keeping a secret for fifty years. But the truth is rarely simple.
The All of It is a very plot-driven novella, 145 pages, set in Ireland and involves the role of religion in society.
A deeply moving tale, a reminder to seek first to understand before being understood.
How much I spent:
Softcover text – Free through Mel-Cat (Michigan Library System)
Connect With Me!
Blog Twitter BookTube Facebook Insta
December 28, 2019
It seems that the author Jeannette Haien had a successful career as a concert pianist and music teacher and then in her 60s thought oh, I’ll write a novel, I suppose, (this one) and it won a prize and people loved it. I bet that will inspire all the unpublished novelists among you. Now you can say to yourselves, oh well, I think I’ll be a concert pianist. And at your very first concert you will win a big prize!
In this tiny novel there is a 13 page long description of a guy catching a fish. The guy is a priest and the fish is a symbol.
This was book 6 in my Goodreads Summer Reading Challenge. So far these have been :
A debut novel : this one! (It is also one of the 1000 Books You Must Read so it’s a two-fer).
A book you can finish in one day : A Christmas Carol
A “most read” book from Goodreads : Normal People.
A book from a different culture : The Village of Waiting.
A new non-fiction book : American Heiress
A translated novel : Journey to the End of Night
A book with a colour in the title : Golden Hill.
Still to do :
The oldest TBR book on your shelf
A book recommended by a GR friend
A 500 page plus novel
Really this has been a fairly lightweight review, or "review" as I call them. But I've been watching a lot of Booktube videos. Do you know Booktube? It's a subset of Youtube, naturally. These people - not ALL of them Young Adult readers - make 10 to 15 minute videos, ranging from painfully awkward ones done entirely in the person's car, as if the people they live with have banned them from talking about books in the house, to semi-professional stuff including edits and low key visual aids. They're kind of fascinating in a zoned-out mechanically-eating-prawn-crackers kind of way. This one video I saw was about the ten longest surviving to-be-read books on this person's shelf. She explained that these books had been there for years, and they had survived numerous annual culls of books, and yet she still thought she probably wouldn't ever read them. 15 minutes of someone musing about not reading ten books over a period of several years. I was hooked. I could do that. I would talk about the heaviest books I own, and I would weigh them on scales to prove it. I would discuss the ugliest covers of the books on my TBR shelves and wonder if that's what's stopping me reading them. I would describe the hilarious things I have found in books I have bought, such as dead insects and unfinished love poems (true!). It would be so interesting. I should be a booktuber.
In this tiny novel there is a 13 page long description of a guy catching a fish. The guy is a priest and the fish is a symbol.
This was book 6 in my Goodreads Summer Reading Challenge. So far these have been :
A debut novel : this one! (It is also one of the 1000 Books You Must Read so it’s a two-fer).
A book you can finish in one day : A Christmas Carol
A “most read” book from Goodreads : Normal People.
A book from a different culture : The Village of Waiting.
A new non-fiction book : American Heiress
A translated novel : Journey to the End of Night
A book with a colour in the title : Golden Hill.
Still to do :
The oldest TBR book on your shelf
A book recommended by a GR friend
A 500 page plus novel
Really this has been a fairly lightweight review, or "review" as I call them. But I've been watching a lot of Booktube videos. Do you know Booktube? It's a subset of Youtube, naturally. These people - not ALL of them Young Adult readers - make 10 to 15 minute videos, ranging from painfully awkward ones done entirely in the person's car, as if the people they live with have banned them from talking about books in the house, to semi-professional stuff including edits and low key visual aids. They're kind of fascinating in a zoned-out mechanically-eating-prawn-crackers kind of way. This one video I saw was about the ten longest surviving to-be-read books on this person's shelf. She explained that these books had been there for years, and they had survived numerous annual culls of books, and yet she still thought she probably wouldn't ever read them. 15 minutes of someone musing about not reading ten books over a period of several years. I was hooked. I could do that. I would talk about the heaviest books I own, and I would weigh them on scales to prove it. I would discuss the ugliest covers of the books on my TBR shelves and wonder if that's what's stopping me reading them. I would describe the hilarious things I have found in books I have bought, such as dead insects and unfinished love poems (true!). It would be so interesting. I should be a booktuber.
December 13, 2018
This novella won a prize for first fiction when it was originally published. It is a rather simple story told in gleaming and very picturesque prose. Has a limited number of characters, a man, a woman and a priest and the story is most told by the woman to the priest. There is some moral interplay here, because as a priest there is a clear line between right and wrong and not much grey, yet here in this little Irish village things may not be what they seem. A;though I am not very fond of fishing stories, though once upon a time I fished quite a bit, this has one of the best fishing scenes that I have read and I found out what a ghillie is.
November 8, 2018
This was a re-read for my book club. I had only rated it two stars before. I’m upping it to three, based on the writing and how perfectly the author gets the language. But the story still did little to nothing for me.
September 28, 2023
I think it's no coincidence the timing this novella has come into my hands. It's perfect reading--all in one sitting--and with the cold rain and fog outside my window a match for the cold rain and fog within this story. Set in an era long gone-an Irish Catholic tight-kit community, anchored together by their religion. Where traumas are bore close to the heart-in a solitude of self. You didn't speak of it you went on with it.
But Enda decides to share her story of sin to Father Declan, who by bearing witness causes him to reflect on his own inner burdens. This relationship--and the healing act of merely listening--and as we offer forgiveness to others we can also be willing to forgive ourselves--becomes a story of healing, beautifully told with a sense of poetry.
The setting of this community envelops the story in a way that makes you feel a part of it.
It brought to me a sense of calm and allowed me to reflect on the burdens of the past as well as the burdens we make ourselves carry. And of how we can let go.
But Enda decides to share her story of sin to Father Declan, who by bearing witness causes him to reflect on his own inner burdens. This relationship--and the healing act of merely listening--and as we offer forgiveness to others we can also be willing to forgive ourselves--becomes a story of healing, beautifully told with a sense of poetry.
The setting of this community envelops the story in a way that makes you feel a part of it.
It brought to me a sense of calm and allowed me to reflect on the burdens of the past as well as the burdens we make ourselves carry. And of how we can let go.
December 1, 2016
When this won the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction in 1987, the author was in her sixties. It’s since been championed by Ann Patchett, who contributed a Foreword to this 2011 edition. Father Declan de Loughry, fishing for salmon, reflects on the recent death of parishioner Kevin Dennehy. Before he died, Kevin admitted that he and Enda were never properly married. Yet Enda begs the priest to approve a death notice calling Kevin her “beloved husband,” promising she’ll then explain “the all of it” – the very good reason they never married. As she tells her full story, which occupies the bulk of the novella, Father Declan tries to strike a balance between the moral high ground and human compassion. Enda’s initial confession on page 27 is explosive, but the rest of this quiet book doesn’t ever live up to it. I was reminded of Mary Costello’s Academy Street, a more successful short book about an Irish life.
Favorite passage: “One thing I’ve learned, Father—that in this life it’s best to keep the then and the now and the what’s-to-be as close together in your thoughts as you can. It’s when you let gaps creep in, when you separate out the intervals and dwell on them, that you can’t bear the sorrow.”
Recently reviewed, along with five other novellas, on my blog, Bookish Beck.
Favorite passage: “One thing I’ve learned, Father—that in this life it’s best to keep the then and the now and the what’s-to-be as close together in your thoughts as you can. It’s when you let gaps creep in, when you separate out the intervals and dwell on them, that you can’t bear the sorrow.”
Recently reviewed, along with five other novellas, on my blog, Bookish Beck.
April 3, 2012
This is one of those unassuming little gems that you run across once in a while. It is set in Ireland, more or less in the current time. Its structure is interesting. It's a story within a story within a story. The first level is a fishing trip that one of the protagonists, Father Declan de Loughry, has taken the day after one of his parishioners, Kevin Dennehy, has died. As he fishes he ruminates about the previous day when he and the dead man's wife, Enda, kept watch by the body. That's the second story. The third story is the one Enda tells him, while they are waiting for the mourners to arrive, of her life with Kevin. The transition between time frames could have been confusing, but it's done with such simplicity and elegance that it all seems effortless. The three levels are tied together nicely by interesting moral questions that, while serious, are presented with subtlety and warmth. All of this in 145 pages. I recommend it highly.
October 14, 2008
Set in Ireland, this short book is the story of a priest, Father Declan, who hears the life story of one of his flock, Enda. Enda's life companion Kevin has just died, and they shared a secret. Their past makes for a harrowing little story in itself, but the real tale here is how it affects Father Declan, who must choose to react as a duty-bound Catholic priest or as a human being, Enda's friend. Throughout, the author weaves beautiful descriptions of the cathartic salmon-fishing trip Father Declan takes the day after Kevin's funeral (and I admired these sections even as someone with no real knowledge of or interest in fishing). In the end, this is a story of redemption and forgiveness, of how we *all* need both. I realized that all of the books I like best share this theme, from The Lord of the Rings on to this slender little gift of a novel. After reading it, I fell asleep peacefully, feeling redeemed myself and reminded of the power of real literature.
August 13, 2011
Jeannette Haien's first novel is getting a new wave of attention these days because novelist Ann Patchett is raving about it on her current book tour. I think many readers will be disappointed. It's really a novella or a long short story, and like those shorter genres favors characters over plot. The All of It is basically the study of two characters: Enda, the beautiful 60-something widow whose husband has gone to his grave carrying their big secret, leaving her to reveal it to their confessor, and Father Declan, the 60-something priest who's torn between his priestly duty and manly needs as he hears the story. The secret itself isn't much of a shock, and the reaction of many readers will be, "That's it!?!" Here's what happens in the novel: Enda tells her story and Father Declan goes fishing. Much is left unsaid and many questions are unanswered. If you read for character and like short stories, this novel may work for you. If you read for plot and prefer novels, probably not.
June 19, 2019
I read this over the course of a single evening, while my dog wondered what kept me planted on the couch. A terrific little story that will stay with me for a long time. Mark Strand perfectly described it as, "the only book I know in which innocence follows experience. A truly amazing thing."
August 29, 2013
The author was in her middle sixties when it was published to good reviews but few sales by David Godine. Harper's Perennial Library republished it in 1988; again it went out of print. Perhaps it's to the credit our country's advance in literacy that it was picked up again for this Harper Perennial paperback, two years ago, with a warm foreword by Ann Patchett, who likens its urgent, disciplined, fascinating package, running fewer than 150 pages, to that of The Great Gatsby; Miss Lonelyhearts; So Long, See You Tomorrow — "each… a world in miniature. I haven't read that third title; let me substitute Carson McCullers's The Ballad of the Sad Café.
To describe the plot is to give its MacGuffin away, but the author does that anyhow after the first sixth of the novel. It concerns Thomas and Enda Dunn, who have lived together as man and wife in Dennery, County Mayo, as hidebound Catholic a setting as imaginable for nearly fifty years, well respected for their simplicity and hard work, and sympathized with for their lack of progeny.
Tom dies having revealed the immediate reason for this but before getting to the proximate cause, persuading Father Declan, warm but strict, to file a customary death notice by promising his widow will provide it. When she does, on page twenty-seven, she has concluded an extraordinarily tense yet seductive short story, a psychological inspection of Father Declan and Enda as they draw the triple revelation into the light of day.
But that's not The All of It. That develops through the rest of the book, which you can hardly help continuing to read without once putting it down. It's a conventional story of abusive father, deprived children, utter poverty; then freedom, fear, flight; ultimately haven. Beyond these rather Brontëesque qualities lie late 20th-century views of the peasant life, the transcendence of Nature, and the virtues of work and frugality — written without sentimentality or nostalgia.
All couched in a literary style that's elegant, compelling, and — well, here's an example from a description of Father Declans trout-fishing through a downpour:
"Trekking the lengthy distance back to the glide, he looked up once from the slippery shoreline and saw a kestrel sitting in the drench of the sky and thought of Kevin — or his tame, envying fondness for the wild, unlimited creature. The bird lingered above him, watching, interested: Ariel observing Caliban… The notion bestowed on him for the first time that day a sense of relationship to the immutable in nature, and, in the soothe of the perspective, he felt himself growing calm."
In the end you may be thinking of the form of this marvelous book, whose first sixth is the rest of the book in microcosm; or you may be reflecting on the two principal characters, fully three-dimensional and engaged in a relationship whose nature is never really revealed or resolved. Or you may, as I do at this moment, be reflecting on the inevitability of death in the opening chapters, and of Life through the rest. As Patchett says, it's "a tale of morality in which we are asked to examine our own judgment," yet also a tale of fidelity and acceptance that urges us to examine ours. "It's a marvel that anywone could accomplish so much in such a short space," but a reassuring marvel and a reminder of other examples in other genres.
To describe the plot is to give its MacGuffin away, but the author does that anyhow after the first sixth of the novel. It concerns Thomas and Enda Dunn, who have lived together as man and wife in Dennery, County Mayo, as hidebound Catholic a setting as imaginable for nearly fifty years, well respected for their simplicity and hard work, and sympathized with for their lack of progeny.
Tom dies having revealed the immediate reason for this but before getting to the proximate cause, persuading Father Declan, warm but strict, to file a customary death notice by promising his widow will provide it. When she does, on page twenty-seven, she has concluded an extraordinarily tense yet seductive short story, a psychological inspection of Father Declan and Enda as they draw the triple revelation into the light of day.
But that's not The All of It. That develops through the rest of the book, which you can hardly help continuing to read without once putting it down. It's a conventional story of abusive father, deprived children, utter poverty; then freedom, fear, flight; ultimately haven. Beyond these rather Brontëesque qualities lie late 20th-century views of the peasant life, the transcendence of Nature, and the virtues of work and frugality — written without sentimentality or nostalgia.
All couched in a literary style that's elegant, compelling, and — well, here's an example from a description of Father Declans trout-fishing through a downpour:
"Trekking the lengthy distance back to the glide, he looked up once from the slippery shoreline and saw a kestrel sitting in the drench of the sky and thought of Kevin — or his tame, envying fondness for the wild, unlimited creature. The bird lingered above him, watching, interested: Ariel observing Caliban… The notion bestowed on him for the first time that day a sense of relationship to the immutable in nature, and, in the soothe of the perspective, he felt himself growing calm."
In the end you may be thinking of the form of this marvelous book, whose first sixth is the rest of the book in microcosm; or you may be reflecting on the two principal characters, fully three-dimensional and engaged in a relationship whose nature is never really revealed or resolved. Or you may, as I do at this moment, be reflecting on the inevitability of death in the opening chapters, and of Life through the rest. As Patchett says, it's "a tale of morality in which we are asked to examine our own judgment," yet also a tale of fidelity and acceptance that urges us to examine ours. "It's a marvel that anywone could accomplish so much in such a short space," but a reassuring marvel and a reminder of other examples in other genres.
March 30, 2024
Around Saint Patrick’s Day this year I saw an Instagram Reel of Ann Patchett recommending some of her favorite Irish novels. I was happy that I’d read almost all of them (I haven’t read “Ulysses” either, Ann) and even happier to discover one that I hadn’t: “The All of it” by Jeannette Haien published in 1986.
It's a short book, a novella really, and so arresting I read it in one sitting.
It’s the story of Father Declan hearing the life story of his parishioner Edna, who has admitted to a particularly troubling sin. Father Declan is immediately intrigued, and so is the reader.
My 2011 copy has a Forward by Ann Patchett. Normally I tell people not to read the Forward first, as they tend to give away key plot points, but God Bless Ann! She doesn’t give anything away, she just lets her love of this little gem ring out!
Thanks for another great recommendation, Ann!
(Reader, if you ever find yourself in Nashville, I highly recommend a stop at Ann’s beautiful Parnassus Book Store.)
It's a short book, a novella really, and so arresting I read it in one sitting.
It’s the story of Father Declan hearing the life story of his parishioner Edna, who has admitted to a particularly troubling sin. Father Declan is immediately intrigued, and so is the reader.
My 2011 copy has a Forward by Ann Patchett. Normally I tell people not to read the Forward first, as they tend to give away key plot points, but God Bless Ann! She doesn’t give anything away, she just lets her love of this little gem ring out!
Thanks for another great recommendation, Ann!
(Reader, if you ever find yourself in Nashville, I highly recommend a stop at Ann’s beautiful Parnassus Book Store.)
April 12, 2020
How this book gets 3.67 stars is beyond me.
The writing alone is worth the venture. Compact and crisp - florid and moving - both at the same time. And the plot line and characters swirl throughout - and life’s pursuits and hopes are recast in the form of an end of season fishing trip. When one has no business hoping for what seems unattainable - maybe the true sin then is in the giving up of the hope.
The writing alone is worth the venture. Compact and crisp - florid and moving - both at the same time. And the plot line and characters swirl throughout - and life’s pursuits and hopes are recast in the form of an end of season fishing trip. When one has no business hoping for what seems unattainable - maybe the true sin then is in the giving up of the hope.
September 29, 2022
♡ ♡ ♡
A wonderful quick read that will transport you to a small town in Ireland. A humble lesson about the sins of life and how we judge others without knowing them. I can understand how this novel received so many awards, I felt like I read a 400-page book about Endas life.
Defiantly would recommend it for a light adult read.
A wonderful quick read that will transport you to a small town in Ireland. A humble lesson about the sins of life and how we judge others without knowing them. I can understand how this novel received so many awards, I felt like I read a 400-page book about Endas life.
Defiantly would recommend it for a light adult read.
November 29, 2022
Can't believe how Irish authors get into your soul the way they do.....
July 16, 2012
This was a very little book that I picked up and started reading at a thrift store. About ten pages in I thought I should probably buy it. It's difficult to cram a whole story into 150 pages, especially when a portion of them are about fly fishing, but Haien pulls it off.
This is, essentially, the story of a priest, Father Declan, who, upon the death of one of his parishoners, Kevin Dennehy, discovers that he has been living a lie with his wife, Enda, for the past fifty years.
It's really a poignant little piece about morality but since I don't have many of those I enjoyed this book for it's story. Enda and Kevin's story was the bulk of the book, taking about about seventy pages, and that was by far my favorite part of this book. Declan's parts consisted of, mostly, moral dilemmas and fly fishing. I don't particularly care for either. But I also greatly enjoy Declan's obvious soft spot for Enda, which came off, to me, as the beginnings of romatic feelings despite his priesthood and her recent berivement. I doubt, should this tale continue, that this would have ended up being the case, but it felt palpable to me.
This is a complicated little tale which is also painfully simple. I suppose, in the end, it's about truth and loss and perceptions and where those tie in with god. I liked it, it was very well done, but I doubt it will stay with me.
This is, essentially, the story of a priest, Father Declan, who, upon the death of one of his parishoners, Kevin Dennehy, discovers that he has been living a lie with his wife, Enda, for the past fifty years.
It's really a poignant little piece about morality but since I don't have many of those I enjoyed this book for it's story. Enda and Kevin's story was the bulk of the book, taking about about seventy pages, and that was by far my favorite part of this book. Declan's parts consisted of, mostly, moral dilemmas and fly fishing. I don't particularly care for either. But I also greatly enjoy Declan's obvious soft spot for Enda, which came off, to me, as the beginnings of romatic feelings despite his priesthood and her recent berivement. I doubt, should this tale continue, that this would have ended up being the case, but it felt palpable to me.
This is a complicated little tale which is also painfully simple. I suppose, in the end, it's about truth and loss and perceptions and where those tie in with god. I liked it, it was very well done, but I doubt it will stay with me.
August 12, 2010
I read this book in one sitting...not so much because it was a great story or the plot was captivating but just because it was so easy too read. I reluctantly gave it 3 stars only because I couldn't give it 2 1/2. I guess I was not a big fan because I feel the author talks about things for the sake of shock and which she knows nothing about. when she says something about Americans and the English wrecking a harbor town by making it a popular visiting place, I wonder if she knows she just did the same with her novel? Only she didn't make any of it enticing for me to visit or experience. But I read it. Now you should read it too and tell me why I'm so wrong.
May 10, 2023
What a gem this little novel is. So glad I caught the recommendation from Ann Patchett this week on her bookshop’s social media where she reminds readers of older books they may have missed. I gobbled it up in a day. The prose was masterful, the story just about perfect. It reminded me a bit of William Maxwell for the beauty of its straightforward sentences and its sensitivity to the strangeness of the human heart. (Later edited to add that it is not an Irish writer as I had supposed, but an American author. I was not surprised to learn that she had been a concert pianist as this novel relies on a certain kind of attention to rhythm and structure.)
December 23, 2022
Good things come in small packages. The All of It is one of those tiny, timeless tales. Impeccably told where a seemingly innocuous sentence or two can tell you so much about a character and their back story. Suspenseful and satisfying. Best read not knowing what lies ahead, so no spoilers here!
Recommended by Ann Patchett in one of her weekly ‘If you haven’t read it, it’s new to you’ segments on Parmassus Books Instagram.
Recommended by Ann Patchett in one of her weekly ‘If you haven’t read it, it’s new to you’ segments on Parmassus Books Instagram.
July 15, 2022
I got this book out of a Free Little Library and I 100% understand why someone would want to get rid of this. It was only 145 pages but I would say that’s 145 pages too long. I know I’m being harsh but I HATED THIS BOOK and it’s like the shortest book I’ve read in my adult life. I could not get behind the relationship between Enda and Kevin. The way they so casually grazed over the sex as if it wasn’t just…not legal? At to add salt to the wound!!! There was way too much plot around fishing. I think I get the idea and message of this book but it was a convoluted way to get there. So happy this book is done. Maybe 1 star was harsh but this was my least favorite book ever.
April 18, 2018
However lyrical this book may be, there was just no story to speak of, no point, really. The plot was thin, at best, the characters under-developed; the "big secret" was predictable and revealed too early on. Because I was not even given a chance to care for the characters before the climax was reached, it left me hoping for more substance. I even assumed that perhaps there was one more big secret, but alas, that was indeed "the all of it"...
December 21, 2020
This slim book might be more of a novella. Religion can be dogmatic and restrictive, particularly Catholicism. Sometimes things happen. An interesting little story about compassion and understanding and how the priest came to look passed a sin and into the circumstance. This was a teaching moment story worth reading.
September 16, 2019
A gem about thwarted, illicit attraction and secrets.
May 19, 2024
This was lovely. Reminded me very much of Claire Keegan
March 12, 2024
I can absolutely see why people have turned to this near-40-year-old novella after luxuriating in the brilliance of Claire Keegan over the past couple of years. It's short, beautifully written, and has heaps of Irish social history embedded between the lines of its prose. It's a good book, filled with undoubtedly gorgeous writing, but it plods along extremely slowly, which stops it's reaching the heights of Keegan's work.
January 3, 2025
Beautiful writing and wonderful characters in a small package. I love the image of Enda and Kevin riding their bikes down the hill like excited children.
October 1, 2018
This is a little gem of a novel which talks about hidden desires, and silent lives. The exploration of love, loss,longing in numerous dimensions.
March 30, 2022
Lovely book, given to me by a lovely person.
December 11, 2017
What a beautiful, heartbreaking story about two people who grow up in spite of horrific childhoods, leave their godforsaken home, find a place for themselves in a small village in Ireland, and make good lives. The influence of religion, both its solace and its proud arrogance and destructive dogma, plays a big part in the story. I loved the language, as well as the tenderness and strength of these characters. Can't recommend it highly enough.
Like the priests in Trevor's A Bit on the Side, the priests in The All of It, have so much power...to absolve, to say a choice is good, or that it's sinful. When Kevin and Enda come to the small town of Roonatellin and find a rundown cottage, Father Daniels has to judge "so gallimaufry a situation, the sincerity of their Christian seemingness, the reality and extent of their skills and finally decide, after putting to himself the question, Why not, in the name of creation, give them their chance at their vision of Eden?" This is the kind of writing that seduced me.
Oh My. "Looking back, I don't see how we did it, Father. The fall, you know, and the winter before us, and having to make the place snug," She shook her head. It was bone-breaking work. There were times I thought Kevin would collapse." "It's mind-boggling how he did it. Yourself, too," he said in a voice which rang with admiration. (101)
It was terrible the way his splendid excitement had vanished almost the instant he'd left the Castle, and started his homeward journey, the lilt and thrill of his great adventure draining from him suddenly, to be as suddenly replaced by a violent flush of self pity caused (admit it) by the sorrowful fact that at the end of the long night drive there would be nought for him but the bulk emptiness of the bleak parish-house, its outside walls bleeding with damp, its windows dark, its high, cold rooms devoid of life, except as he would enter them only to encounter , going before him in the chilly chamber, the exhaled ghostly haze of his own breath...that deadliness, juxtaposed to the powerfulness vivid of its imagined opposite: anticipation of a lit window, of a waiting presence, of a voice asking those simple, linking, engaging questions which absence inspires: "How are you?" "How did you fare?" "What was it like?" (134, 135)
I can hear the Irish lilt in all these sentences. I'm not quite sure how she did it...caught the horror of a poverty-struck Irish childhood, the love of a brother and sister who clung to each other in order to survive and the love of a doctrinaire priest who let himself be changed by listening, by an attention that overcame the things he saw as sin, revealing them as a glorious endurance. I loved this book. Even more, on second reading.
And now, reading it again with a book club in December 2017, I'm reminded of how I love how fierce Enda is. She asks Father Declan to listen to her as a friend as she tells her story, and Kevin's story. He replies that he can't divide himself that way. Enda is furious. Fr. Declan clearly hasn't understood what their situation had been. But she persists in telling him, and he persists in listening and trying to understand. By the end, it's clear she has caught him. He's half in love with her. Who wouldn't be? And the theme of fishing and luring and netting runs through the entire river of the story.
Father Declan encourages Enda not to "dwell on the story. It'll do no good..I can't imagine how terrible it must have bee."
"No you can't," she said abruptly, though not unkindly. "It's something that can't be imagined. But you're right, Father, that it does no good to dwell on it, all these years later especially. At the time, though, we had nought but to dwell on it. (54) (66) when they realize they are free. (68) We were so green, you know. Hardly born, as you might say, in terms of what we knew of the world." (70) They go to Ballymote and work, then to Roonah Quay. Fr.Declan wants to hear it all and Enda is astonished. "Father dear, that you care so!" She opened out her hands to him. 84/85
"You've netted me with your telling," he said with a rushing sense of elation. You can see how this story traps you, nets you, takes you in. other moments: p. 92, 95, 101
As I write about it, I love this book even more.
Like the priests in Trevor's A Bit on the Side, the priests in The All of It, have so much power...to absolve, to say a choice is good, or that it's sinful. When Kevin and Enda come to the small town of Roonatellin and find a rundown cottage, Father Daniels has to judge "so gallimaufry a situation, the sincerity of their Christian seemingness, the reality and extent of their skills and finally decide, after putting to himself the question, Why not, in the name of creation, give them their chance at their vision of Eden?" This is the kind of writing that seduced me.
Oh My. "Looking back, I don't see how we did it, Father. The fall, you know, and the winter before us, and having to make the place snug," She shook her head. It was bone-breaking work. There were times I thought Kevin would collapse." "It's mind-boggling how he did it. Yourself, too," he said in a voice which rang with admiration. (101)
It was terrible the way his splendid excitement had vanished almost the instant he'd left the Castle, and started his homeward journey, the lilt and thrill of his great adventure draining from him suddenly, to be as suddenly replaced by a violent flush of self pity caused (admit it) by the sorrowful fact that at the end of the long night drive there would be nought for him but the bulk emptiness of the bleak parish-house, its outside walls bleeding with damp, its windows dark, its high, cold rooms devoid of life, except as he would enter them only to encounter , going before him in the chilly chamber, the exhaled ghostly haze of his own breath...that deadliness, juxtaposed to the powerfulness vivid of its imagined opposite: anticipation of a lit window, of a waiting presence, of a voice asking those simple, linking, engaging questions which absence inspires: "How are you?" "How did you fare?" "What was it like?" (134, 135)
I can hear the Irish lilt in all these sentences. I'm not quite sure how she did it...caught the horror of a poverty-struck Irish childhood, the love of a brother and sister who clung to each other in order to survive and the love of a doctrinaire priest who let himself be changed by listening, by an attention that overcame the things he saw as sin, revealing them as a glorious endurance. I loved this book. Even more, on second reading.
And now, reading it again with a book club in December 2017, I'm reminded of how I love how fierce Enda is. She asks Father Declan to listen to her as a friend as she tells her story, and Kevin's story. He replies that he can't divide himself that way. Enda is furious. Fr. Declan clearly hasn't understood what their situation had been. But she persists in telling him, and he persists in listening and trying to understand. By the end, it's clear she has caught him. He's half in love with her. Who wouldn't be? And the theme of fishing and luring and netting runs through the entire river of the story.
Father Declan encourages Enda not to "dwell on the story. It'll do no good..I can't imagine how terrible it must have bee."
"No you can't," she said abruptly, though not unkindly. "It's something that can't be imagined. But you're right, Father, that it does no good to dwell on it, all these years later especially. At the time, though, we had nought but to dwell on it. (54) (66) when they realize they are free. (68) We were so green, you know. Hardly born, as you might say, in terms of what we knew of the world." (70) They go to Ballymote and work, then to Roonah Quay. Fr.Declan wants to hear it all and Enda is astonished. "Father dear, that you care so!" She opened out her hands to him. 84/85
"You've netted me with your telling," he said with a rushing sense of elation. You can see how this story traps you, nets you, takes you in. other moments: p. 92, 95, 101
As I write about it, I love this book even more.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 30, 2018
2.5 stars. More of a depiction of a moment than a traditional novel. 80% of it is a conversation between a parishioner and a priest -- a confession in his mind, an accounting of facts in hers. The novel is structured as the priest remembering the conversation from a few days earlier while fly fishing. The novel goes into themes of companionship and judgement. It was an interesting read and well-written, but wasn't particularly compelling. My favorite part of the book was probably the introduction by Ann Patchett.
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