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Delia Scully #1
Never No More
When Delia's family moves away, Delia goes to live with her grandmother in a farmhouse in the Irish countryside. Here, she experiences the happiest years of her life as she watches the seasons come and go until, one November day, she stands poised for independence - and Spain.
304 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1942
4 people are currently reading
296 people want to read
About the author
Maura Laverty
38 books6 followersMaura Laverty (née Kelly; 1907 - 26 July 1966) was an Irish author, journalist and broadcaster known for her work on Irish soap opera Tolka Row. She published several novels, short stories and critical pieces throughout her career.
Born in Rathangan, County Kildare in Ireland, Laverty was educated at Brigidine Convent, Carlow, where she studied teacher-training.[1] She later moved to Spain, taking up the position of governess and later secretary to Princess Bibesco and eventually becoming a foreign correspondent based within Madrid. Laverty returned to Ireland for the remainder of her career and worked as a journalist and broadcaster in Dublin for the national radio station, RTÉ.
Upon her return to Ireland she married the journalist James Laverty in 1928. They had three children,[2] one of whom was the artist Barry Castle (see Barry and Philip Castle) who illustrated some of her mother's work (See below, the Queen of Aran's Daughter.).
Her first novel Never No More was published to widespread acclaim in 1942. It was based in County Kildare, drawing heavily on personal experiences during her time in Derrymore House.[3] Laverty would follow this with such works as Touched by the Thorn (1943) and Alone We Embark (1943). Two of her books were banned in the Republic of Ireland, including her second, the semi-autobiographical No More than Human, which apparently offended the censor because of its frankness about the female body.[2]
She is well known as the writer of RTÉ's Tolka Row, the station's first soap opera that ran between 1964–68, itself largely an adaptation of her play Liffey Lane. Laverty also wrote numerous children's stories including The Cottage in the Bog (1946) and The Green Orchard (1949).[2]
Born in Rathangan, County Kildare in Ireland, Laverty was educated at Brigidine Convent, Carlow, where she studied teacher-training.[1] She later moved to Spain, taking up the position of governess and later secretary to Princess Bibesco and eventually becoming a foreign correspondent based within Madrid. Laverty returned to Ireland for the remainder of her career and worked as a journalist and broadcaster in Dublin for the national radio station, RTÉ.
Upon her return to Ireland she married the journalist James Laverty in 1928. They had three children,[2] one of whom was the artist Barry Castle (see Barry and Philip Castle) who illustrated some of her mother's work (See below, the Queen of Aran's Daughter.).
Her first novel Never No More was published to widespread acclaim in 1942. It was based in County Kildare, drawing heavily on personal experiences during her time in Derrymore House.[3] Laverty would follow this with such works as Touched by the Thorn (1943) and Alone We Embark (1943). Two of her books were banned in the Republic of Ireland, including her second, the semi-autobiographical No More than Human, which apparently offended the censor because of its frankness about the female body.[2]
She is well known as the writer of RTÉ's Tolka Row, the station's first soap opera that ran between 1964–68, itself largely an adaptation of her play Liffey Lane. Laverty also wrote numerous children's stories including The Cottage in the Bog (1946) and The Green Orchard (1949).[2]
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September 2, 2018
4.5 stars rounded up
Another find from my favourite book haven and I can never resist a second hand virago modern classic. It portrays village life in Ireland in the 1920s; set in a village on the edge of the bog of Allen. It is a strongly autobiographical novel.
I had barely heard of Maura Laverty before this, but she wrote a number of novels, children’s books and some very popular cookery books. She was also involved in journalism and broadcasting in Ireland in the 1960s. Some of her novels fell foul of the Irish censor and were banned for a while for being a little too open about female sexuality.
The novel is the story of teenage Delia Scully, who after the death of her father, having an uneasy relationship with her mother, goes to live with her grandmother on her farm. The novel has great charm, can be rather sentimental, but is a sharp and amusing description of country life in 1920s Ireland. Laverty is a great storyteller and observer of human nature. The countryside and its characters really do come alive, life and death go hand in hand with religion and politics. The political struggles are referenced indirectly as they affect the lives of some of the characters. The Catholic Church is central although the religion of many of the villagers is a mixture of Catholic superstition and what is clearly earlier pagan folk tales, remedies and traditions.
The novel most comes alive with the descriptions of food and cookery and you can certainly tell that the author also wrote cookbooks. The whole book revolves around gran’s kitchen and her baking. The descriptions of the breads, hot griddle cakes, ash cakes, freshly picked and cooked mushrooms, fresh blackberries, cream (oceans of cream), pools of butter, potato apple cakes oozing with butter and sugar. As Maeve Binchy says in the introduction to the virago edition, her descriptions of food could cajole the dying to eat. The descriptions of how the pig was turned into such a variety of dishes (the slaughter of a pig was an annual event) is not for the squeamish.
The character of gran is a remarkable creation; providing physical and emotional sustenance to all those around her, even the travellers on the edge of society and those on the edge of village life for one reason or another. She is the local wise woman and that covers several meanings of that word.
I thoroughly enjoyed this; the writing really is three dimensional and the characters, descriptions of the countryside and especially the food just jump off the page. An inmate of the Arbour Hill Military Prison in Dublin wrote to Laverty to thank her for the book and to say how much he and the other prisoners had enjoyed it. That prisoner was Brendan Behan, no mean writer himself.
Another find from my favourite book haven and I can never resist a second hand virago modern classic. It portrays village life in Ireland in the 1920s; set in a village on the edge of the bog of Allen. It is a strongly autobiographical novel.
I had barely heard of Maura Laverty before this, but she wrote a number of novels, children’s books and some very popular cookery books. She was also involved in journalism and broadcasting in Ireland in the 1960s. Some of her novels fell foul of the Irish censor and were banned for a while for being a little too open about female sexuality.
The novel is the story of teenage Delia Scully, who after the death of her father, having an uneasy relationship with her mother, goes to live with her grandmother on her farm. The novel has great charm, can be rather sentimental, but is a sharp and amusing description of country life in 1920s Ireland. Laverty is a great storyteller and observer of human nature. The countryside and its characters really do come alive, life and death go hand in hand with religion and politics. The political struggles are referenced indirectly as they affect the lives of some of the characters. The Catholic Church is central although the religion of many of the villagers is a mixture of Catholic superstition and what is clearly earlier pagan folk tales, remedies and traditions.
The novel most comes alive with the descriptions of food and cookery and you can certainly tell that the author also wrote cookbooks. The whole book revolves around gran’s kitchen and her baking. The descriptions of the breads, hot griddle cakes, ash cakes, freshly picked and cooked mushrooms, fresh blackberries, cream (oceans of cream), pools of butter, potato apple cakes oozing with butter and sugar. As Maeve Binchy says in the introduction to the virago edition, her descriptions of food could cajole the dying to eat. The descriptions of how the pig was turned into such a variety of dishes (the slaughter of a pig was an annual event) is not for the squeamish.
The character of gran is a remarkable creation; providing physical and emotional sustenance to all those around her, even the travellers on the edge of society and those on the edge of village life for one reason or another. She is the local wise woman and that covers several meanings of that word.
I thoroughly enjoyed this; the writing really is three dimensional and the characters, descriptions of the countryside and especially the food just jump off the page. An inmate of the Arbour Hill Military Prison in Dublin wrote to Laverty to thank her for the book and to say how much he and the other prisoners had enjoyed it. That prisoner was Brendan Behan, no mean writer himself.
January 2, 2020
Maura Laverty's Never No More is about Delia and how she grows up under the care of her beloved Gran, on her farm, Derrymore House. The farm is within walking distance of a small village Ballyderrig, in County Kildare, Ireland.
Delia, or 'little Delyeen" as she is known to everyone is invited to live with her grandmother on the death of her father. The story opens with her father's funeral:
The smell of death was still in the house. It met us as soon as I opened the back door. The others went into the parlour behind the shop, and I went upstairs to put away my new black coat and hat.
The smell was so heavy in the front bedroom where my poor father had been lain out two nights before that there was no staying in the room at all. I went in for a minute, but it drove me out - that and the fear of what I might see if I stayed looking at his bed. He had lain there dying for a year and half, and it was hard to imagine the bed without him.
When I went down to the parlour the smell was not so bad. It was nearly drowned by the left-over smell of the whiskey and stout that had been drunk at the wake.
And the book ends with her grandmother's death, four year later in 1924 when Delia is coming up for her eighteenth year.
When I awoke next morning Gran was sleeping, but her breathing frightened me. It was harsh and loud and there were two rouge-like spots of colour in her cheeks. When she awakened I brought her a cup of tea. She drank it thirstily but she would eat nothing. I had never seen Gran ill before, and I was frightened.
"Shouldn't I go in for Doctor Mangan, Gran?" I said. It was hard to keep my lips from trembling.
"No, Delia, alanna. It's just that old cold. I'll lie here for an hour or two and I'll be right by dinner-time. Did the Loughlins get their breakfast?"
By evening her breathing had become so much worse that I went for the doctor without consulting her. When Dr Mangan had seen her he told me to wire for my mother.
Perhaps without reading the book you can tell that the deaths are quite differnt, in terms of what they mean for Delia.
There is a lot of death in the book, but in spite of this the book is lighthearted and fun and reflects the happiness of those years for Delia in her grandmother's house. We are introduced to all the local people and hear all about their lives and troubles and merrymaking. Some of it is quite hard to read, because it concerns poverty and lack of basic knowledge. Several children and adults too succumb to the horrific disease consumption - which literally no longer exists, due to medical advances and treatment with antibiotics.
At the end I worked out which year our narrator was born in and then I checked the author's date of birth - 1907. If I am remembering correctly it is the same year in which my grandmother was born, and I could imagine her living a very similar life to Delia's Gran, Mrs Lacy.
There are loads of Irish words which I know most people will not recognize, but I was surprised to find that there were many I had heard my mother use. A rich harvest of vocabulary which meant nothing at all to myself or my brothers as we grew up in England.
... the Nolans are not going to be shamed by letting Molly go from them without a hooley. If I have to cook the food myself, there will be a send-off for Molly on the night she's married.
The above is when Gran offers to cook and prepare all the food for the wedding party of her neighbour's daughter.
Whenever a cow calved, we had beestings curd. Beestings were the first milk the cow gave after calving. Grandmother would strain the rich yellow beestings and set them in a pie-dish in the baker. They were heated very slowly until they set in a curd. We ate the curd with cream and sugar.
The beestings were always shared with the neighbours. When they heard the cow had calved they would come over to Derrymore House with jugs in their hands and a blessing on their lips.
Surprisingly I know what "the beestings" are.
"Say a prayer for me, Gran," I said when we said good-bye after Easter.
"Will you listen to her?" she said laughingly. For all her laughing, I knew she was as near to tears as I was, for these partings were becoming more and more difficult for both of us. It was as if we realized that we ought to be making the very most of the time that was left to us. It was almost as if we knew how short that time was to be. "Will you listen to her? Amn't I always praying for you, you little oinseach?"
When I began the book, I found I could only read it in small sections - either it took awhile for me to settle into the pace of her writing or it took her awhile to settle into the confident narrative voice that develops. I also felt that I had to slow my reading to the pace of life - in this village in the early 1920s - there are no great dramatic events, but plenty of rapes, still-births, deaths, disease, farm accidents; they just all blend into normal village events, as told by Delia from the safe haven of her Gran's house.
Some modern readers may find the tale limited and unworldly. There are a few minor references to The Treaty - to the Republicans, the Black and Tans etc, but the heart of this story is about the village people - I'm sure Tolstoy would approve.
I loved the recipes, the language, the dialogue, the raw, gritty details of people without refinement or soap and at the centre of the book this completely engaging story of the relationship between Delia and Gran.
Delia, or 'little Delyeen" as she is known to everyone is invited to live with her grandmother on the death of her father. The story opens with her father's funeral:
The smell of death was still in the house. It met us as soon as I opened the back door. The others went into the parlour behind the shop, and I went upstairs to put away my new black coat and hat.
The smell was so heavy in the front bedroom where my poor father had been lain out two nights before that there was no staying in the room at all. I went in for a minute, but it drove me out - that and the fear of what I might see if I stayed looking at his bed. He had lain there dying for a year and half, and it was hard to imagine the bed without him.
When I went down to the parlour the smell was not so bad. It was nearly drowned by the left-over smell of the whiskey and stout that had been drunk at the wake.
And the book ends with her grandmother's death, four year later in 1924 when Delia is coming up for her eighteenth year.
When I awoke next morning Gran was sleeping, but her breathing frightened me. It was harsh and loud and there were two rouge-like spots of colour in her cheeks. When she awakened I brought her a cup of tea. She drank it thirstily but she would eat nothing. I had never seen Gran ill before, and I was frightened.
"Shouldn't I go in for Doctor Mangan, Gran?" I said. It was hard to keep my lips from trembling.
"No, Delia, alanna. It's just that old cold. I'll lie here for an hour or two and I'll be right by dinner-time. Did the Loughlins get their breakfast?"
By evening her breathing had become so much worse that I went for the doctor without consulting her. When Dr Mangan had seen her he told me to wire for my mother.
Perhaps without reading the book you can tell that the deaths are quite differnt, in terms of what they mean for Delia.
There is a lot of death in the book, but in spite of this the book is lighthearted and fun and reflects the happiness of those years for Delia in her grandmother's house. We are introduced to all the local people and hear all about their lives and troubles and merrymaking. Some of it is quite hard to read, because it concerns poverty and lack of basic knowledge. Several children and adults too succumb to the horrific disease consumption - which literally no longer exists, due to medical advances and treatment with antibiotics.
At the end I worked out which year our narrator was born in and then I checked the author's date of birth - 1907. If I am remembering correctly it is the same year in which my grandmother was born, and I could imagine her living a very similar life to Delia's Gran, Mrs Lacy.
There are loads of Irish words which I know most people will not recognize, but I was surprised to find that there were many I had heard my mother use. A rich harvest of vocabulary which meant nothing at all to myself or my brothers as we grew up in England.
... the Nolans are not going to be shamed by letting Molly go from them without a hooley. If I have to cook the food myself, there will be a send-off for Molly on the night she's married.
The above is when Gran offers to cook and prepare all the food for the wedding party of her neighbour's daughter.
Whenever a cow calved, we had beestings curd. Beestings were the first milk the cow gave after calving. Grandmother would strain the rich yellow beestings and set them in a pie-dish in the baker. They were heated very slowly until they set in a curd. We ate the curd with cream and sugar.
The beestings were always shared with the neighbours. When they heard the cow had calved they would come over to Derrymore House with jugs in their hands and a blessing on their lips.
Surprisingly I know what "the beestings" are.
"Say a prayer for me, Gran," I said when we said good-bye after Easter.
"Will you listen to her?" she said laughingly. For all her laughing, I knew she was as near to tears as I was, for these partings were becoming more and more difficult for both of us. It was as if we realized that we ought to be making the very most of the time that was left to us. It was almost as if we knew how short that time was to be. "Will you listen to her? Amn't I always praying for you, you little oinseach?"
When I began the book, I found I could only read it in small sections - either it took awhile for me to settle into the pace of her writing or it took her awhile to settle into the confident narrative voice that develops. I also felt that I had to slow my reading to the pace of life - in this village in the early 1920s - there are no great dramatic events, but plenty of rapes, still-births, deaths, disease, farm accidents; they just all blend into normal village events, as told by Delia from the safe haven of her Gran's house.
Some modern readers may find the tale limited and unworldly. There are a few minor references to The Treaty - to the Republicans, the Black and Tans etc, but the heart of this story is about the village people - I'm sure Tolstoy would approve.
I loved the recipes, the language, the dialogue, the raw, gritty details of people without refinement or soap and at the centre of the book this completely engaging story of the relationship between Delia and Gran.
July 4, 2025
Loved loved loved! Thank you Dominika for the encouragement to read this lovely book. I’ve been reading so many excellent Irish writers in the last year. The heart of this book is teenage Delia’s relationship with her grandmother. After the death of her father, Delia goes to live with her Gran in the small town of Ballyderrig. It’s an escape for dreamy Delia who clashes with her business-like, ambitious mother. Delia and her Gran have the most wonderful relationship and Delia’s sense of belonging grows and grows over the course of the novel. Delia and Gran’s story is interwoven beautifully with tales of their fellow Ballyderrig residents who are full of comedy, woe, and everything in between. Gran is just wonderful. With the wisdom of years, she is generous with her time and resources and cooking ability (which is masterful!) to all her neighbors and friends. She is completely trustworthy and always responds to Delia’s questions and struggles with thoughtful responses that don’t shame. It’s one of the best relationships I’ve read this whole year.
The food detail in this is just amazing too! I love when novels talk about cooking and food. Every chapter almost has some new delicacy. There’s a whole chapter about killing a pig and how creative they are with the whole animal. Put me down in time for tea at Derrymore House please. I could ask for nothing better. Delia and Gran’s Catholic faith is beautifully woven into the story too. It’s the faith of Ordinary Time, in a way. Days come and days go and the faithful live hidden but meaningful lives.
Highly recommend! Can’t wait to get to the sequel.
The food detail in this is just amazing too! I love when novels talk about cooking and food. Every chapter almost has some new delicacy. There’s a whole chapter about killing a pig and how creative they are with the whole animal. Put me down in time for tea at Derrymore House please. I could ask for nothing better. Delia and Gran’s Catholic faith is beautifully woven into the story too. It’s the faith of Ordinary Time, in a way. Days come and days go and the faithful live hidden but meaningful lives.
Highly recommend! Can’t wait to get to the sequel.
June 6, 2025
2025 review:
Still the best little known book out there. It captured my heart all over again. My favorite parts this time included when they go mushroom picking and refer to a certain kind of fluffy white mushroom as "sheepfarts," when Frank Price doesn't understand the facts of life or why his full term son was born six months after his wedding with flaming red hair, when Granny Lynn sneakily holds up a necklace to be blessed among the rosaries, Delia and Sister Conleth's cozy secret needlework meetings in the infirmary, all Gran's advice to Delia, and of course all the food descriptions.
There are a lot of sad and painful stories in here too but I come away from it basking in its celebration of the goodness of God's world: of good food, of the beauty of nature, of marriage, of babies, of kinship, of physical work with your hands, of poetry, and of faith. I can't think of anyone I wouldn't recommend it to.
2024 review:
I absolutely adored this semi-autobiographical coming of age story set in rural 1920s Ireland, and I was surprised to find so much in common between my teenage self and the protagonist, Delia, who loves poetry and writing, her Catholic faith, and her wonderful Gran--one of the best characters I've come across recently.
There were so many other great things here--glorious food writing (I bookmarked more pages than I possibly ever have in a book for the mouth-watering passages alone), excellently written character sketches, and an honest and sympathetic perspective of faith and religious life.
Highly recommended for fans of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn or Maeve Binchy's Circle of Friends.
Still the best little known book out there. It captured my heart all over again. My favorite parts this time included when they go mushroom picking and refer to a certain kind of fluffy white mushroom as "sheepfarts," when Frank Price doesn't understand the facts of life or why his full term son was born six months after his wedding with flaming red hair, when Granny Lynn sneakily holds up a necklace to be blessed among the rosaries, Delia and Sister Conleth's cozy secret needlework meetings in the infirmary, all Gran's advice to Delia, and of course all the food descriptions.
There are a lot of sad and painful stories in here too but I come away from it basking in its celebration of the goodness of God's world: of good food, of the beauty of nature, of marriage, of babies, of kinship, of physical work with your hands, of poetry, and of faith. I can't think of anyone I wouldn't recommend it to.
2024 review:
I absolutely adored this semi-autobiographical coming of age story set in rural 1920s Ireland, and I was surprised to find so much in common between my teenage self and the protagonist, Delia, who loves poetry and writing, her Catholic faith, and her wonderful Gran--one of the best characters I've come across recently.
There were so many other great things here--glorious food writing (I bookmarked more pages than I possibly ever have in a book for the mouth-watering passages alone), excellently written character sketches, and an honest and sympathetic perspective of faith and religious life.
Highly recommended for fans of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn or Maeve Binchy's Circle of Friends.
November 25, 2025
A wonderful sense of time and place. I'm looking forward to No More Than Human.
March 1, 2014
Maura Laverty’s first novel Never No More, and its later follow up No More than Human, are autobiographical novels based upon Maura Laverty’s own life in County Kildare, and her subsequent life in Spain. I was first introduced to these novels thanks to lovely reviews of them on Fleurinherworld’s blog.
As Never no More opens, thirteen year old Delia Scully returns from her father’s funeral. Her family is a large one, she is one of nine children, and she is not her mother’s favourite at all, is often criticised and unfavourably compared to one of her sisters. However Delia is fortunate to enjoy a close relationship of mutual love and understanding with her Grandmother. So when Delia’s mother decides to move to Kilkenny and open a new drapery business Delia is overjoyed to be invited to live with her Grandmother in Ballyderrig.
Ballyderrig is a small village on the edge of The Bog of Allen, a place of great beauty described by Laverty with eager enthusiasm. The community is traditional, mainly Catholic; a community of turf cutters, farmers, spinsters, widows and even a prostitute who is tolerated by everyone, where young girls marry fifty year old farmers and babies come frequently. Delia loves her life with her beloved gran at Derrymore House which she shares with Judy Ryan who works for her.
“The bog was never so beautiful as in May, when we cut the turf. A white road stretching straight and true as a taut ribbon ran gladly through that gentle spread of lovely colour. For a little distance, the full beauty of the bog was screened by the hedges that bordered the road – hedges of foaming May blossom and twisted mountain ash and swaying bog-willow. Later, the wild convolvulus would join each bush and tree with wildly-flung vines dripping with purple and white bells, and the honeysuckle and sweet briar would do their most fragrant best to kill your memories of the scent of departed hawthorn. At each side, a grassy bank climbed from the dust of the road to meet the green of the hedge. Innocent dog-daisies, slim-fingered ferns and tenacious Robin-run-the-hedge mingled with the waving little pink flags unfurled by the wild vetch.”
For Laverty herself, although she had a gran – it seems she was not quite the woman portrayed in Never No More, Laverty’s creation is the grandmother we all would want. Delia’s gran, Mrs Lacy – approaching seventy with her book of remedies and her ability to cook and care for anyone who needs it – is a loved and respected member of the community. Mrs Lacy is a gently pious woman who still kneels by her bed and utters the prayer she learnt as a child. When Delia is tormented with guilt about her relationship with her mother and siblings, her grandmother is able to wipe it out with understanding and wisdom.
Never No More is full of small Irish village life, a round of weddings, wakes, dances and pig killings and the rites and traditions surrounding these landmark occasions. Delia’s simple life is blessed; when she wished desperately for a new bicycle her grandmother makes sure she gets one. The people who visit Derrymore House, and to whom Mrs Lacy sends Delia on errands enthral the eager young girl with their stories and Laverty tells these stories with great affection. The one shadow hanging over Delia is her grandmother’s wish for her to be a school teacher. Delia is destined to go to the convent school at Wicklow to study when she is old enough. Unsure that teaching is the right path for her, Delia hates the thought of being separated from gran, but she desperately doesn’t want to disappoint her grandmother either.
When she is fifteen Delia goes to Wicklow to school, heart sore at being separated from her grandmother and Ballyderrig Delia struggles to adjust. Distracted by poetry – her great love, and finding French and mathematics just too hard Delia begins to fall behind in her studies. She also manages to get on the wrong side of one of the sisters –and Delia’s rage against the woman, who does appear unnecessarily harsh, blinds her to the fact that the nun is really only doing what she believes to be her duty. Soon enough though, Delia’s misery is brought to a halt by the sensible and timely intervention of her grandmother.
There is an inevitable sadness to the end of the novel – which I am sure anyone can see coming. As the novel ends Delia is approaching seventeen – although there seems to be a confusion of dates in my 1985 Virago Modern Classics edition due to an unfortunate and obvious misprint – and so her story is far from over. Delia’s story is continued in No More than Human – which I made sure I bought at the same time as this novel, so glad that I did I am sure I will read it soon. This was such a lovely read – peopled with memorable larger than life characters, surely based upon people the author knew as a girl. The voices of these characters Laverty captures perfectly, the whole novel rings clearly with the gentle Irish cadence of their speech.
As Never no More opens, thirteen year old Delia Scully returns from her father’s funeral. Her family is a large one, she is one of nine children, and she is not her mother’s favourite at all, is often criticised and unfavourably compared to one of her sisters. However Delia is fortunate to enjoy a close relationship of mutual love and understanding with her Grandmother. So when Delia’s mother decides to move to Kilkenny and open a new drapery business Delia is overjoyed to be invited to live with her Grandmother in Ballyderrig.
Ballyderrig is a small village on the edge of The Bog of Allen, a place of great beauty described by Laverty with eager enthusiasm. The community is traditional, mainly Catholic; a community of turf cutters, farmers, spinsters, widows and even a prostitute who is tolerated by everyone, where young girls marry fifty year old farmers and babies come frequently. Delia loves her life with her beloved gran at Derrymore House which she shares with Judy Ryan who works for her.
“The bog was never so beautiful as in May, when we cut the turf. A white road stretching straight and true as a taut ribbon ran gladly through that gentle spread of lovely colour. For a little distance, the full beauty of the bog was screened by the hedges that bordered the road – hedges of foaming May blossom and twisted mountain ash and swaying bog-willow. Later, the wild convolvulus would join each bush and tree with wildly-flung vines dripping with purple and white bells, and the honeysuckle and sweet briar would do their most fragrant best to kill your memories of the scent of departed hawthorn. At each side, a grassy bank climbed from the dust of the road to meet the green of the hedge. Innocent dog-daisies, slim-fingered ferns and tenacious Robin-run-the-hedge mingled with the waving little pink flags unfurled by the wild vetch.”
For Laverty herself, although she had a gran – it seems she was not quite the woman portrayed in Never No More, Laverty’s creation is the grandmother we all would want. Delia’s gran, Mrs Lacy – approaching seventy with her book of remedies and her ability to cook and care for anyone who needs it – is a loved and respected member of the community. Mrs Lacy is a gently pious woman who still kneels by her bed and utters the prayer she learnt as a child. When Delia is tormented with guilt about her relationship with her mother and siblings, her grandmother is able to wipe it out with understanding and wisdom.
Never No More is full of small Irish village life, a round of weddings, wakes, dances and pig killings and the rites and traditions surrounding these landmark occasions. Delia’s simple life is blessed; when she wished desperately for a new bicycle her grandmother makes sure she gets one. The people who visit Derrymore House, and to whom Mrs Lacy sends Delia on errands enthral the eager young girl with their stories and Laverty tells these stories with great affection. The one shadow hanging over Delia is her grandmother’s wish for her to be a school teacher. Delia is destined to go to the convent school at Wicklow to study when she is old enough. Unsure that teaching is the right path for her, Delia hates the thought of being separated from gran, but she desperately doesn’t want to disappoint her grandmother either.
When she is fifteen Delia goes to Wicklow to school, heart sore at being separated from her grandmother and Ballyderrig Delia struggles to adjust. Distracted by poetry – her great love, and finding French and mathematics just too hard Delia begins to fall behind in her studies. She also manages to get on the wrong side of one of the sisters –and Delia’s rage against the woman, who does appear unnecessarily harsh, blinds her to the fact that the nun is really only doing what she believes to be her duty. Soon enough though, Delia’s misery is brought to a halt by the sensible and timely intervention of her grandmother.
There is an inevitable sadness to the end of the novel – which I am sure anyone can see coming. As the novel ends Delia is approaching seventeen – although there seems to be a confusion of dates in my 1985 Virago Modern Classics edition due to an unfortunate and obvious misprint – and so her story is far from over. Delia’s story is continued in No More than Human – which I made sure I bought at the same time as this novel, so glad that I did I am sure I will read it soon. This was such a lovely read – peopled with memorable larger than life characters, surely based upon people the author knew as a girl. The voices of these characters Laverty captures perfectly, the whole novel rings clearly with the gentle Irish cadence of their speech.
November 13, 2018
After the death of her father, Delia goes to live with her grandmother in a small Irish town. I found myself reading slowly to savor this charming autobiographical novel about the loving relationship between Delia and her grandmother. The carefully described details place the reader firmly in rural Ireland in the 1920s, and the frequent descriptions of her grandmother’s country cooking are (almost) as good as a feast.
April 9, 2013
As I commented on Catherine Carswell's Open the Door!, the Virago press has pretty heavily featured the debut autobiographical bildungsroman from women who subsequently have admirable literary careers but are somewhat forgotten a couple of generations later.
As with Carswell, the death of the father is the catalyst for changes in the teenage girl protagonist's life which shape her - in this case, she moves in with her grandmother, experiencing and chronicling adolescence via country village life in Ireland in the 1920s. While her mother and siblings move to a small city, becoming apprentices and prosperous small shopkeeper, she follows the less ambitious quotidian rhythms of a small farm, largely organized around the kitchen. In fact, despite eight novels, three plays (one of which was the basis for a soap opera) and a handful of children's stories, it is for her books on cookery that she is best remembered and the food writing in this story is warm and detailed - quite worth the read all by itself.
As with Carswell, the death of the father is the catalyst for changes in the teenage girl protagonist's life which shape her - in this case, she moves in with her grandmother, experiencing and chronicling adolescence via country village life in Ireland in the 1920s. While her mother and siblings move to a small city, becoming apprentices and prosperous small shopkeeper, she follows the less ambitious quotidian rhythms of a small farm, largely organized around the kitchen. In fact, despite eight novels, three plays (one of which was the basis for a soap opera) and a handful of children's stories, it is for her books on cookery that she is best remembered and the food writing in this story is warm and detailed - quite worth the read all by itself.
September 10, 2013
Delightful account of the lives of a young girl and her grandmother in early 1900s Ireland.
Descriptions of their daily chores and their colorful village neighbors make this a fun and insightful read.
Only thing I disliked was the intense account of killing and gutting their annual Christmas pig. :(
Descriptions of their daily chores and their colorful village neighbors make this a fun and insightful read.
Only thing I disliked was the intense account of killing and gutting their annual Christmas pig. :(
wish-list
February 27, 2015Thanks for the recommendation Brazilliant!
December 4, 2025
Wonderful!
March 10, 2015
Another oldie but goodie unearthed from my mom's bookshelves, this is a story of growing up in a tiny Irish village just after the Great War. For some reason it made me think of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, although they have little in common other than being a coming-of-age memoir.
The story opens as Delia Scully's father has just died, necessitating the family's move from their small town to a more business-friendly one. Delia doesn't have a particularly good relationship with her mother, so when Gran suggests Delia live with her instead, Delia is overjoyed. She and her grandmother feel a special connection and under her care, Delia blooms.
Delia shares the story of her years with her grandmother, filling us in on the village characters, the activities of the farm, the trivia of daily life there. The detailed description of the foods they prepared and ate, the clothes they wore, were fascinating to me.
The story opens as Delia Scully's father has just died, necessitating the family's move from their small town to a more business-friendly one. Delia doesn't have a particularly good relationship with her mother, so when Gran suggests Delia live with her instead, Delia is overjoyed. She and her grandmother feel a special connection and under her care, Delia blooms.
Delia shares the story of her years with her grandmother, filling us in on the village characters, the activities of the farm, the trivia of daily life there. The detailed description of the foods they prepared and ate, the clothes they wore, were fascinating to me.
January 1, 2015
I thoroughly enjoy this sweet story of young Delia Scully and her Gran, living in the small town of Ballyderrig near the Bog of Allen, Ireland. Anyone who has had a beloved grandmother will recognize her in Delia's feisty, loving, first rate cook of a Gran. In 1920. Delia's father dies, and unable to get along with her mother, she goes to stay with her Gran until she is 17. A good share of the book is devoted to food and how it's made, the fascinating local characters and their equally fascinating histories that populate Ballyderrig. There is even the specter of the IRA and the recent troubles between Republicans and those who with to remain British subjects, but it is only a minor thread in this cozy domestic story.
January 27, 2020
Marple bookworms book club read.
What an amazingly poignant and lyrical book. I’m so glad we got to read this. The stories woven throughout about each family and person made the book for me. It reminded me of our own family tales within the extended family and brought back so many lovely memories. I loved the relationship between Delia and Gran and wish there is someone similar in every child’s life.
What an amazingly poignant and lyrical book. I’m so glad we got to read this. The stories woven throughout about each family and person made the book for me. It reminded me of our own family tales within the extended family and brought back so many lovely memories. I loved the relationship between Delia and Gran and wish there is someone similar in every child’s life.
June 2, 2008
Absolutely delightful.
http://kasiapontificates.blogspot.com...
http://kasiapontificates.blogspot.com...
Want to read
February 28, 2015From Political World:
Maura Laverty was a household name fifty years ago, one of very few women in Irish public life at that time. She was a cookery writer, a journalist, a radio "agony aunt", a playwright and a novelist.
She also created Ireland's first ever television soap - Tolka Row - which broadcast on Telefís Éireann from January 1964 until May 1968.
She is not widely remembered today. But back in the 1940s, her first novel, Never No More, created huge controversy in her home town of Rathangan, Co. Kildare, and her next three novels were banned.
Her four novels were all banned as indecent/obscene in Ireland. She does not appear to have been heavily politically involved but she wrote the script for the Clann na Phoblachta introductory film, narrated by Sean MacBride and believed that one of her novels was banned for its descriptions of Dublin's shocking slum housing conditions.
Maura Laverty was a household name fifty years ago, one of very few women in Irish public life at that time. She was a cookery writer, a journalist, a radio "agony aunt", a playwright and a novelist.
She also created Ireland's first ever television soap - Tolka Row - which broadcast on Telefís Éireann from January 1964 until May 1968.
She is not widely remembered today. But back in the 1940s, her first novel, Never No More, created huge controversy in her home town of Rathangan, Co. Kildare, and her next three novels were banned.
Her four novels were all banned as indecent/obscene in Ireland. She does not appear to have been heavily politically involved but she wrote the script for the Clann na Phoblachta introductory film, narrated by Sean MacBride and believed that one of her novels was banned for its descriptions of Dublin's shocking slum housing conditions.
February 12, 2020
I have had this book for many years but reread it now. Published in 1942 it deals with life in a small Irish village with its different characters who all have nicknames - very appropriate too. It deals with the love or difficulties in families and the overwhelming role that Catholicism had in their lives. I enjoyed reading about village life, food and habits.
January 20, 2017
Often wish I had an OED dictionary instead of a Webster's. Lots of local words. Very comforting story as that love often skips a generation. My grandmother's was much closer than my mother.
Interested to see there is more than one tale of Delia.
Interested to see there is more than one tale of Delia.
July 24, 2024
I will give this book 3.5 stars because I know it will show up as a 4-star rating on GoodReads and I would prefer that to a 3-star rating because I think it’s better than a 3-star rating. Got that? 🧐 🙂🙃
I just saw that this study only has 16 reviews from Goodreads readers. That is so so sad. This was such a good book compared to so much crap out there that gets bestseller status. Arghhhhh!
Having gotten that off my chest...and after having gone off on a rant....
This book sort of reminded me of ‘Anne of Green Gables’. It involved a girl that was older than Anne at the books’ outset, Delia who was 13, but she lived with her grandmother (“Gran’), just as Anne (who was 11 when that book started) lived with two older folks, Marilla and Matthew. I think Anne tended to go off on tangents and Delia in this book went off on tangents, too.
This book was 75% novel and 25% cookbook. At first the descriptions of the different things Gran prepared and cooked were interesting, but it started to wear on me a bit the longer I got into the book. Still, some of the recipes were mouth-watering and I could just picture the food. And the description of all the things that the grandmother and the people in her village made from a single pig was quite interesting, if not at times a bit too much for me. I don’t think there was one part of that pig they didn’t eventually eat. I can be snooty about this because I can pretty much eat whatever I want whenever I want. Those poor Irish folks in the 1920s did not have the same choices and quantity of foods as we have nowadays.
Synopsis of story from the back of my Virago Modern Classics re-issue (with foreword from Maeve Binchy):
• It is October 1920 and 13-year-old Delia looks forward to a new life. Her father dead, her mother, brothers and sisters prepare to move to the town of Kilkenny. But Delia stays behind, going to live with her beloved grandmother in an old farmhouse outside the village of Ballyderrig. And thus begin the happiest years of this young girl’s life: years filled with the beauty of the Irish countryside, the texture of young mushrooms picked at dawn, the rituals of the turf-cutting season, and much much more. As the seasons come and go we watch Delia grow up until, once cold November day, now seventeen, she stands poised for independence — and Spain.
Life was sometimes rough, very rough, for people that Maura knew in the village. Some children were crippled...some children died early of various diseases...some women died in childbirth...women tended to have over 10 children born to them with a number of them dead...and near the end of the book there was increasing mention of the Black and Tans and De Lavera. Still, perhaps remarkably (?) it was a very positive upbeat read. I recommend it.
Review:
• https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2014/...
Note
• This looks like an interesting journal article about the author: 'The red ink of emotion': Maura Laverty, women's work and Irish society in the 1940s, by Caitríona Clear. Published in the journal, Saothar, Voume 28, 2003), pp. 90-97. Published By: Irish Labour History Society
I just saw that this study only has 16 reviews from Goodreads readers. That is so so sad. This was such a good book compared to so much crap out there that gets bestseller status. Arghhhhh!
Having gotten that off my chest...and after having gone off on a rant....
This book sort of reminded me of ‘Anne of Green Gables’. It involved a girl that was older than Anne at the books’ outset, Delia who was 13, but she lived with her grandmother (“Gran’), just as Anne (who was 11 when that book started) lived with two older folks, Marilla and Matthew. I think Anne tended to go off on tangents and Delia in this book went off on tangents, too.
This book was 75% novel and 25% cookbook. At first the descriptions of the different things Gran prepared and cooked were interesting, but it started to wear on me a bit the longer I got into the book. Still, some of the recipes were mouth-watering and I could just picture the food. And the description of all the things that the grandmother and the people in her village made from a single pig was quite interesting, if not at times a bit too much for me. I don’t think there was one part of that pig they didn’t eventually eat. I can be snooty about this because I can pretty much eat whatever I want whenever I want. Those poor Irish folks in the 1920s did not have the same choices and quantity of foods as we have nowadays.
Synopsis of story from the back of my Virago Modern Classics re-issue (with foreword from Maeve Binchy):
• It is October 1920 and 13-year-old Delia looks forward to a new life. Her father dead, her mother, brothers and sisters prepare to move to the town of Kilkenny. But Delia stays behind, going to live with her beloved grandmother in an old farmhouse outside the village of Ballyderrig. And thus begin the happiest years of this young girl’s life: years filled with the beauty of the Irish countryside, the texture of young mushrooms picked at dawn, the rituals of the turf-cutting season, and much much more. As the seasons come and go we watch Delia grow up until, once cold November day, now seventeen, she stands poised for independence — and Spain.
Life was sometimes rough, very rough, for people that Maura knew in the village. Some children were crippled...some children died early of various diseases...some women died in childbirth...women tended to have over 10 children born to them with a number of them dead...and near the end of the book there was increasing mention of the Black and Tans and De Lavera. Still, perhaps remarkably (?) it was a very positive upbeat read. I recommend it.
Review:
• https://heavenali.wordpress.com/2014/...
Note
• This looks like an interesting journal article about the author: 'The red ink of emotion': Maura Laverty, women's work and Irish society in the 1940s, by Caitríona Clear. Published in the journal, Saothar, Voume 28, 2003), pp. 90-97. Published By: Irish Labour History Society
February 25, 2012
A young Irish girl lives with her grandmother in a small Irish village. There is a special bond between Delia and Gran, something Delia doesn't have with her own mother. Many anecdotes about village residents.
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