Patricia Byrne

This Irish Citizen found hope from an unexpected source in a week when four children died violently in rooms at their homes and the IMF and ECB arrived in Ireland.  My source of hope came from Emma Donoghue’s novel  Room. In a 12-ft square room where a sky-light gives the only glimpse of the outside world, a young woman nurtures her child and preserves her own sanity through the power of language, storytelling and imagination.

I could not have believed that I would turn to such a book in a week when we were shocked and numbed by public and private tragedy. How could a novel that evoked the horror of a family’s incarceration by Joseph Fritzl  bring hope? But it did just that for me in a memorable and multi-layered read.

Five year old Jack finds richness and wonder in the confined room that he shares with Ma – he knows no other world. It is a place where he has  ‘thousands of things’ to do  like following a spider’s movements, watching a new leaf emerge from a potted plant and listening to Ma‘s advice: ‘It’s called mind over matter. If we don’t mind it doesn’t matter.’

This trailer for Room catches some of its magic, I think.

This is my book of the year.

Maybe you found hope this week gone in story?