West Cork Inheritance Pulls Grief and Secrets Ashore
Rebecca Murphy begins with a West Cork inheritance, then lets grief, marriage strain and old family silence rise through the story. The island setting gives Susan’s escape a lovely unease, turning a coastal retreat into a reckoning with what lingers.
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Blood and Water
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West Cork Inheritance Pulls Grief and Secrets Ashore
Rebecca Murphy begins with a West Cork inheritance, then lets grief, marriage strain and old family silence rise through the story. The island setting gives Susan’s escape a lovely unease, turning a coastal retreat into a reckoning with what lingers.
- Book Synopsis
-
Susan arrives on Dune Island with a plan, settle her late uncle's estate, sign the papers, and leave within a week. The inheritance is simple, a weathered cottage, a small distillery, a stubborn dog named Walter. On paper, nothing she couldn't sort in a week.
Except Susan isn't just there to close a chapter. She's running, from Jen, from a loss she cannot yet name, and from a life that has quietly unravelled.
But Dune Island has been keeping its own secrets.
Cut off on the edge of the Wild Atlantic Way, where the ferry runs on Mick's time and every glance carries a question, Susan begins to uncover what her uncle Frank left behind, not just property, but a lifetime of silence. And the longer she stays, the more the island reveals, buried stories, unspoken grief, a family history shaped as much by what was hidden as by what was known.
And as the past begins to surface, Susan must confront the truths she came to escape.
She came to Dune Island to be alone. The island had other ideas.
Blood and Water is a haunting, beautifully observed novel about identity, inheritance, and the quiet devastations that echo through generations. With warmth, wit, and emotional precision, Rebecca Murphy introduces a striking new voice in fiction, one that lingers long after the final page.
Winner of the RTÉ Today Show Novel Competition
Ideal for readers who:
- Gravitate towards contemporary Irish fiction about grief, inheritance and fresh starts.
- Enjoy following Susan on Dune Island as mere paperwork transforms into an emotional reckoning.
- Love losing themselves in West Cork settings, distillery life and tight-knit community secrets.
- Appreciate a tender atmosphere, quiet resilience and the undeniable pull of home.
- About The Author
- Rebecca Murphy is a writer from Cork, living in Wicklow with her wife and two dogs. Blood and Water is her debut novel. She was the winner of the RTÉ Today Show novel competition and the recipient of a Faber Academy Scholarship. Her influences range from Anne Enright to Stephen King, by way of Maeve Binchy. She has a degree in Drama and English from UCC.
- Product Details
-
- ISBN
- 9781917453851
- Format
- Paperback
- Publisher
- Mercier Press, (12 May 2026)
- Number of Pages
- 388
- Language
- English
- Dimensions
- 215 x 135 mm
- Categories: