The Irish Goodbye: A Novel

Heather Aimee O'Neill

Sep 2025 · Macmillan Audio · Narrated by Kristen Sieh

About this audiobook

National Bestseller

A #ReadWithJenna book club pick following an Irish American family with three adult sisters returning home to Long Island to face tension-filled dinners, ghosts from their pasts, and family secrets in a gripping novel full of biting wit and profound heart.

It’s been years since the three Ryan sisters were all together at their beloved family home. Two decades ago, their lives were upended by a fatal accident on their brother Topher’s boat. Now the Ryan women are back and eager to reconnect, but each carries a heavy secret. The eldest, Cait, still holding guilt for the role no one knows she played in the boat accident, rekindles a flame with her high school crush. Middle sister Alice has been thrown a curveball that threatens the career she’s restarting and faces a difficult decision that may doom her marriage. And the youngest, Maggie, is finally taking the risk of bringing the woman she loves home to meet her devoutly Catholic mother.

When Cait invites a guest from their shared past to dinner, old tensions boil over and new truths surface, nearly overpowering the flickering light of their family bond. Far more than a family reunion will be ruined unless the sisters can find a way to forgive one another—and themselves.

A Macmillan Audio production from Henry Holt & Company

Ratings and reviews

I listened to the audio version of this book narrated by Kristen Sieh. The narration was so good that I was able to submerse my self totally in the story. This book is family drama at it's best. Three sisters have come back to the family home for Thanksgiving. Their family hasn't been the same since their brother died, but they are( maybe somewhat reluctantly) trying to make the best of their time together. There are several issues in the book that might be triggers, especially if you are Catholic. There is drug use, abortion and suicide playing parts in the drama. This is an extremely well written book. I loved the writing style and the dynamics that went into all of the characters as they interacted. I highly recommend! Thanks to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for the audiobook. All thoughts are my own.

I’m sorry, but I just don’t get it. This book was such a struggle to get through. We have a dysfunctional family full of barely tolerable people who don’t know how to talk to each other. For most of the book, nothing happens aside from lots of melodrama. I listened to the audiobook. All the characters blended together! This was not the narrator’s fault. She did a good job of distinguishing vocal tones. But I couldn’t keep track of which sister was doing what and why. These characters were different enough that I should have been able to tell them apart, so why was this happening? Maybe because they were all introduced at once. Maybe because they were all shallow, lacking complexities. Maybe because the drama overshadowed their personalities. Probably a combination of all that, and something else I can’t pinpoint. I kept pushing through, hoping for that emotional pull so many readers talked about. I never felt it. In the end, the whole thing is forgettable. *Thanks to Macmillan Audio for the free audiobook download!*

About the author

Heather Aimee O’Neill is a poet, a teacher, and the assistant director of the Sackett Street Writers’ Workshop. She lives in Brooklyn with her wife and two sons. The Irish Goodbye is her first novel.