Reviews

Bessborough: Three Women. Three Decades. Three Stories of Courage by Deirdre Finnerty

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dmalexander's review

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dark emotional informative sad fast-paced

5.0

Content Warnings

thetwirlonthetrain's review

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challenging dark emotional hopeful inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

wordsofclover's review

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emotional informative inspiring reflective sad fast-paced

4.0

A non fiction book looking at the dark time in Irish history when mother and baby homes run by the Catholic Church were rampant, and women who were unmarried and fell pregnant were hidden away from society and their babies taken from them. This book examines Bessborough, an infamous mother and baby institute in County Cork and three brave women tell their story of their stays there in the 60s,70s and 80s and how the stay affected them, and their years long battle to be reunited with their lost children.

This was a fantastic book that is well paced, conversational in tone and I feel like it would be an easy and accessible read for every kind of reader. This is a really good introduction to the topic of mother and baby homes in Ireland, and while this does focus on Bessborough - the main theme of the book is telling the women's stories - women who have been silenced and made to feel guilty at every turn they've taken to take a hold of their own story. I think the author Deirdre Finnerty treated the women with such respect and kindness, something they hadn't experienced a whole lot of in their lives.

There are always moments in every story about this topic that shocks me even when I think I can no longer be shocked, that I've read it all. While there wasn't horrific details of abuse or mother and baby deaths in this book, the treatment of the girls was still so hard to read and the way the church and other systems in Ireland made it so hard for these women to find out what happened to their children. I was blind with fury reading Terri was escorted from her new home in England to Bessborough by priests and nuns - literally extradited because of her pregnancy. It was truly shocking.

I definitely recommend this for people to read.