Tara Road: An emotional, uplifting story of friendship and family from a beloved #1 bestselling author

Maeve Binchy

Dec 2009 · Hachette UK

About this ebook

With a new introduction by Lorraine Kelly, Sunday Times bestselling author of THE ISLAND SWIMMER

'This is Binchy at her best' MAIL ON SUNDAY

'A brilliant storyteller' GRAHAM NORTON

Ria and Marilyn have never met, but they're about to switch lives for the summer...

Ria Lynch lives in a big, warm, Victorian house in Tara Road, Dublin, where her life revolves around family and friends. Marilyn Vine lives thousands of miles away in a quiet, modern house in New England. After a terrible loss, she has closed herself off from the world. Two more unlikely friends would be hard to find, but when each needs a place to escape to, a house exchange seems the ideal solution. Along with the borrowed houses come neighbours and friends, gossip and speculation, and Ria and Marilyn soon realise that swapping lives won't be the peaceful escape they'd been hoping for ... Though it might turn out to be exactly the change they both needed.

*AN OPRAH BOOK CLUB PICK*

Ratings and reviews

I have read this book many times before, but it’s such a long time since I opened it last it was almost like reading it for the first time. Ria and Marilyn have never met, but circumstances lead them both to needing to be on the opposite sides of the Atlantic at the same time. Luckily the connection is made between them and Ria flies off to a modern open-plan apartment in New England while Marilyn heads to a beautiful old home in Tara Road, Dublin. These women are very different creatures – will this be a summer which brings them what they seek? There is no one else who writes like Maeve Binchy and I had forgotten that! She understands and writes about human nature better than anyone else I’ve ever come across and I wallowed in Tara Road. This isn’t so much a novel about two women but more a story about people in two very different neighbourhoods and it is bursting with warmth and humour. I can’t begin to explain why I loved this so much, but I did and it is, once again, easily worth ten stars, but I can only give it five – please know that they are all sparkling brighter than any others!

Full of well rounded characters as always. Excellent read.

Tara road

About the author

Maeve Binchy was born in County Dublin and educated at the Holy Child convent in Killiney and at University College, Dublin. After a spell as a teacher she joined the Irish Times. Her first novel, LIGHT A PENNY CANDLE, was published in 1982 and she went on to write over twenty books, all of them bestsellers. Several have been adapted for cinema and television, including TARA ROAD. Maeve Binchy received a LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD at the BRITISH BOOK AWARDS in 1999 and the Irish PEN/A. T. CROSS AWARD in 2007. In 2010 she was presented with the BOB HUGHES LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD at the BORD GAIS IRISH BOOK AWARDS by the President of Ireland. She was married to the writer and broadcaster Gordon Snell for 35 years, and died in 2012. Visit her website at www.maevebinchy.com