My Father's House

It had not been a conscious decision to cling to the better memories of his childhood. It had just happened when Hannah came along and the possibility of a brighter future dragged his scowling face away from the details of his past. Now, standing in the middle of the poorly part-mowed field, in front of the house that was hiding all the reasons he had run away, he wondered if it would be possible to hold the past and present in tension.' Robbie Hanright has a normal, settled life in Dublin. With a wife and baby, an undemanding job and a nice home, everything is just as he wants it. However, after an enduring estrangement from the rural landscape of his youth, Robbie receives a phone call from his sister asking him to come home. Left with little choice, Robbie returns once more to County Down, and to Larkscroft Farm, to confront the father who tormented his childhood and face up to a history he wants only to forget. Set against the backdrop of a decaying farmhouse and fragile family connections, My Father's House is a powerful, lyrical story of loss and regret, through which Bethany Dawson reveals an affecting compassion for the profound, and often painful, complexities of family life.