I love family drama novels but this one felt a little shallow. The getting out of prison plot was solid but Geraldine was so annoying it was hard to get too invested. I also felt like the romance subplot was underdeveloped

I've read this book in a few hours in one sitting. It is such a quick read. After losing their mom at a young age and being abandoned by their deadbeat father the three siblings learned to take care of another. Main character of the novel, Tara, is loyal and selfless to a fault. She'd do anything for her family. In his brother's own words "I don't think you do the rest of us and favors when you don't let us carry our own burdens"

I liked Tara's relationships with her nephew and her employers. I wasn't crazy about the romantic relationship. I think there was a clear power imbalance.

Tracey Lange does complicated and messy family dramas well. If you liked We Are The Brennans I think you'd like The Connellys of County Down too.

The author made Tara and her date go to Brennan's for dinner. I was grinning from ear to ear when I caught the reference.

The Connellys are a family comprised of a hoarder, a loser, and a felon, to paraphrase Eddie in Chapter 12. Well, and the sweetness that is Conor, Eddie's son, who Tara would do anything to protect. I love her devotion to him and her family and how that overshadows everything she had to go through in prison and after coming home. Take these flawed people and story, and weave throughout the fairytale story told by their long deceased mother about how the three of them had to work together to save the castle in her bedtime story The Connellys of County Down. The story continues to come back to this fairy tale to remind the readers and characters that above else, they are family, for good and bad. This book wasn't perfect. The coincidences were too many, the repercussions were somewhat unrealistic, but this book was a joy to read! But Ms. Lange does family intricacies really really well!

The Connellys of County Down begins with Tara Connelly being released from prison after serving 18 months due to a drug trafficking charge. While incarcerated, she doesn't see much of her 2 siblings Geraldine and Eddie, and neither of them show up to pick her up. After returning home, she soon finds that so much as changed since she left, and not for the better.

Geraldine is the oldest sister and has taken care of her Eddie and Tara since she was a young teen. We quickly learn that she has had too much pressure and responsibility on her shoulders for far too long and it has begun to have devastating impacts on her life.

Eddie suffers from a traumatic brain injury and is doing his best as a single dad. His son Conor brings comedic relief to the novel.

This was such a beautiful story examining the impact that familial relationships can have on our lives and the decisions we make. I loved how each of the Connelly siblings had a role that they played in keeping their dysfunctional family together.

One of my favorite messages from the story was that it's okay to ask for help. I really appreciated that the author included therapy in the story and that it wasn't just mentioned, but was a crucial part.

This one was easily bingeable. I finished about 65% of it in one sitting because I couldn't put it down. It was perfectly executed, and I have zero complaints. I will definitely be reading We Are the Brennans and anything else that Tracey Lange writes.

My review will be posted to my instagram on Wednesday, July 26. https://www.instagram.com/readingwithtrey/

Tracey Lange does family drama so so well!

The Connellys of County Down is a story of three siblings navigating life after the youngest is released from prison.

We follow each sibling and the struggles they are dealing with. Tara needs will no longer be able to teach children due of her conviction and needs to find a new job, the oldest sister, Geraldine is struggling at work, and their brother, Eddie, is still learning how to deal with daily activities after a TBI.

This book is all about dealing with grief, love, hope, and forgiveness.

Tracey does such an amazing job of writing vulnerable and perfectly flawed characters that you cant help but root for!

Read this if you like:
- family drama
- difficult family dynamics
- family secrets
- messy but lovable characters

Tara Connelly just got out of prison on a drug charge. Basically starting over she moves in with her siblings and her nephew. As she starts to pick up the pieces of her life the cop that arrests her keeps showing up. Even though he put her away she can't help but deny her attraction to him. Things aren't ever what they seem though. Her family has their fair share of secrets. And some secrets can rip their family apart.

This was my first book by Tracey Lange and it won't be my last. This book is told in multiple POVs, which I love. You get to see what is going on in the story but all sides. I did call the twist early on, but still was invested in the book. I can't wait to read Tracey Lange's first book!

I really liked most of the characters in this book. The older sister drove me nuts at times but after finishing the book and really thinking about it I felt bad for her. All three siblings have had to carry secrets and trauma around. It's no wonder why their family is a bit messy. I thought the author did a great job at navigating through the family dynamics. I really liked Tara. She was such a strong female character. I connected with the brother too. I have two brain conditions, not as bad as his, but I do have a headache everyday from them. I can understand when they get so bad how debilitating they can be. It was nice for the author to show that families aren't always perfect...families have problems. I think it was great to show how mental illness can impact a person and the people around them. I really liked Brian too.

I listened to the book as I read it. I thought the narrator did a great job. I would have liked to have different narrators for the different POVs though. Thank you to NetGalley, Celadon Books and Macmillan Audio for the copies of this book!

4.5 family dynamic stars

We meet our main character, Tara Connelly, as she is being released from an 18-month prison sentence for a drug charge. At only 30, she’s got a long life in front of her, but it will be difficult with the crime on her record. She’s not able to teach art to young kids anymore, and finding any job proves to be quite difficult. I do love the job she finds, doing illustrations for two young men with a gaming company.

She does have two siblings, but they have their own issues to deal with. Older sister Geraldine is hiding some big secrets and her actions threaten Tara’s future.

Her brother Eddie has issues from an accident years ago where he suffered a brain injury. He’s a single dad and Tara is devoted to her nephew.

Then there’s the cop who arrested her. He keeps popping up in her life and Tara isn’t sure what to make of him. And how could she be attracted to him?

This author does an excellent job of building realistic characters with flaws that you grow to root for. The main characters are very well done, and we even get great side characters that add to the story. She also shows the difficult road for someone coming out of prison and the onerous tasks from parole officers. I had some anxiety for Tara reading this book and I hoped that nothing would happen that would send her back to jail.

I really like this author and this is her second book that I’ve read and enjoyed, she goes on the favorite list! I definitely recommend this one!

💭Thoughts:
This is a beautifully emotional character driven story. I honestly wasn’t expecting to fall in love with these characters like I did. I really felt for Tara and what she went through. The love she had for her nephew was really remarkable. It’s hard for me to put into words exactly why I loved this book without giving things away about the story. It’s more enjoyable to learn the family secrets as they happen.

I highly recommend this book to readers who enjoy family dramas filled with lots of love, secrets, and past traumas.

Tracey Lange has officially established herself as the queen of Irish family dramas.

A young woman just released from a 2 year prison sentence returns to live with her brother, sister, and nephew and attempts to fit back into her former life. The Connelllys are each dealing with their own demons, though and Tara seems to be the catalyst for change, both good and bad.

I adore how Tracey writes incredibly real characters with flaws we all recognize. These aren’t page-turning thrillers, but quietly captivating stories of families fighting yet supporting each other, love dealing with obstacles, and redemption in a variety of forms.

I could not get invested in this book. I thought the characters needed more development and more to them. I didn’t connect with them or the atmosphere.

Very surprised by how much I ended up loving this one!! I only requested this because it was a BOTM choice so I figured I’d give it a go without really knowing what it was about. I ended up loving it so so much! I really loved Tara and not only her relationship with Brian, but with her family as well. I do wish there was like one more chapter though so the whole Connelly family could reunite with their dad. I would’ve liked to see that.

Well this book just wrapped up everything I could want in a contemporary family drama and put a lovely (but understated) Irish bow on it. My great-great-great grandparents of County Carlow would be proud!

It’s been a while since I read We Are the Brennans, but I think I enjoyed this one even more. The story centers on Tara, just released from prison on a drug charge, and how she and her family struggle and adapt and protect each other as she rejoins them.

The sibling dynamics here were so interesting and multifaceted — seeing how Tara, Eddie, and Geraldine all push and pull on each other drew me in. Plus, there were so many other great relationships that built throughout — Tara and her little nephew Connor, the local police team (who are an uncle and nephew pair), Tara and new friends she makes along the way…some are brutal at times, but most are so uplifting ❤️ Add in the intrigue around the drug network that got Tara sent to jail in the first place? You’ve got a first-rate mix.

I’ve loved Tracey Lange’s books for the gentle but spot-on way they highlight the hallmarks of Irish American families and communities. Even generations removed from Ireland, the heavily Irish Catholic area I grew up in had many of the same personalities and values on display — a heavy emphasis on loyalty and fighting for your own, an emotional reservedness that later generations sometimes seek to overcome, and a dogged determination to do whatever needs to be done for your family to survive.

Very much enjoyed the Connellys’ story, and look forward to more from Tracey Lange!!

Thanks so much to Celadon, the author, and NetGalley for my gifted digital copy. The Connellys of County Down hits shelves on August 1 (and is available as a Book of the Month pick)!

Okay! Very pleasantly surprised by The Connellys of County Down. This definitely surpassed all of my expectations and I quite enjoyed it!

This is about the three Connelly siblings, each with their fair share of life’s difficulties. The story starts with one of the siblings, Tara, being released from prison. The reason why she was there, what happens upon her release, and her relationship with the cop that helped put her there are the heart of this plot.

Maybe I’m a literary snob, but I expected very little from this book. Instead, what I found inside was a really beautiful sibling story about the lengths we will go for those we grew up alongside. I found a sibling set I grew attached to almost instantly and I could not put this down until I knew their fates. This story of sacrifice and shame and secrets felt so relatable despite some of the not so relatable (for me) circumstances. I don’t have a whole lot else to say about this book. It’s a sibling story, that’s what you need to know. And it went down easily and was all consuming while reading.

The Connellys of County Down is officially my favorite book of the summer. It is a story of family, love, and forgiveness. Tracey Lange is such a phenomenal author. She writes with so much heart and emotion. I wasn’t able to put this book down and finished it in record time! I am such a fan of books that revolve around family and the chaos that surrounds them. It always has me hooked, and the Connellys immediately stole my heart and full attention. Thank you to NetGalley and Celadon Books for this egalley in exchang for an honest review!

THE CONNELLYS OF COUNTY DOWN follows the three Connelly siblings -- Tara, who was recently released from prison after serving eighteen months on a drug charge, Eddie, a single dad struggling with the ongoing effects of a brain injury he sustained years ago, and Geraldine, the bossy older sister harboring secrets and obsessions that are reaching a breaking point . The story centers arounds the individual complexities of each character and how they affect each other.

Typically, literary fiction with a huge focus on character-develop instead of plot is my favorite -- but this one didn't quite hit the mark. I didn't really like any of the characters, so I didn't really feel the need to root for them along the way (other than Connor, loved him).

As a fan of WE ARE THE BRENNANS, I'll definitely read more from Lange in the future -- but probably won't be recommending this one as much as her first.

When Tara Connelly gets out of prison for drug running, she returns home to her brother, sister, and nephew. As she starts to get back into normal life, the cop who put her away reappears in her life. Her brother and sister have their own problems, and Tara finds herself just one step away from being sent back to prison.

This is the second book by the author of We Are the Brennans, which I loved. This book is similar in tone to that one but a completely different family. I really liked this one (although it was a bit weird reading a book where I share the same name as the main character). I liked the characters and thought they were well written, and the action of the book actually moves forward. It was not a perfect book- there were a few things that were repeated too often- her lack of a cell phone and the fairy tale that their mother told them as children about The Connellys of County Down. I found these things too repetitive, and they took me out of the story. However, I really enjoyed this family drama. It reminded me not only of her first book, but also of older Denis Lehane books.

Thank you to Netgalley for the advance copy for review.

Equal parts cute and frustrating. The whole ex-con and the-cop-who-put-them-there dynamic is a little ick for me, though they do a good job of addressing the power dynamic. The main character’s sister does nothing but lie and keep secrets the whole time, which makes her super unlikeable, and her actions ultimately become the main conflict of the novel. An interesting commentary on keeping secrets and the damage that can do. Points for being self-aware and having cute, flawed, believable family relationships.

Tara Connelly returns home after serving time in prison. She moves back in with her brother, Eddie, and sister, Geraldine. As she settles in at home, she notices her siblings acting differently than she remembers. Eddie looks pretty nervous around her and Geraldine has become a "collector" of things. The only family member happy to see her is her nephew, Conor, Eddie's son. Tara knows she has to get a job, one of her parole criteria. It is not easy since she has to divulge her time in prison or it is discovered during the background check. To further complicate her life, she keeps running into one of the officers that put her in prison, to begin with! There is a spark between them. How can Tara step back into her life? What is going on with her siblings? The Connelly's dysfunctional family has descended to an entirely new level.

On the surface, this book is about a parolee trying to acclimate back into society. There are other layers to this story, however. Eddie and Geraldine are nervous around Tara, why? Tara needs to build a relationship of trust with her parole officer but Tara keeps finding herself in one kind of trouble or another. Will the interesting policeman help Tara? Is he using her to further his career? There are so many questions. Tracey Lange answers all of these questions in due time. The Connellys have truly hit a rough patch and need each other to regroup and repair all that has gone astray. Family dynamics, drugs, prison, revenge, and redemption are powerful themes that Tracey Lange combines into a vividly interesting story.

I really loved this wonderfully written, complex, and heartfelt family drama. It felt a little slow to start, we have to wait a little bit for the action to shake down, which I was anxious to find out about, but I think the purpose of that down time was to flesh out each character and get us truly invested in and rooting for Tara, Eddie, and even the rigid and often unlikeable Geraldine - which paid off. I was completely invested in the siblings and their secrets.

This is a story about family (with a little forbidden romance in the mix). The Connelly family is a complicated one, in which each member has made poor decisions and is flawed in his or her own way, but is doing the best they can with what they've got. The thing that binds them is their unwavering love and loyalty to one another... even if it's messy and dysfunctional. Relatable? Yep!

Sidenote: I 1,000% thought this was going to be a story that took place in Ireland, and I even imagined that the audiobook would be narrated in an Irish Brogue (no such luck, but Barrie Kreinik did a great job!). It actually takes place in the same town (in New York.. not Ireland) as Lange's debut novel, The Brennans, though the books stand alone.

Thank you to Tracy Lange and Celadon books for the advanced copy (and the audiobook! I loved switching off between kindle and audio for this, depending on what I was doing!). I would love to see these characters again in a sequel!

This will be out on August 1st! I hope you add it to your TBR!

“The most honest words didn’t have to be loud or dramatic to cut deep.”

Is it presumptuous of me that I just assumed this would be a five star read because of how much I loved We Are The Brennans? Whatever the answer, I was not wrong.

Tracey Lange’s writing is just so engrossing. She writes family and family dynamics like almost no other author. So much so that sometimes, when I read her books, I feel like I’m peeking inside someone’s house and watching their lives unfold without their knowledge. I LOVED the Connelly family. I loved their rawness and their dysfunction, but also their overwhelming loyalty to each other and underneath that…the love. This is a family riddled with hardships but that always perseveres.

The audiobook was awesome and I am so glad I had it because I just couldn’t put this one down! So I listened when I couldn’t physically read and that just helped me to get even more lost in this family. The narrator did an amazing job of giving each character their own voice and really capturing their essence. I feel like I just watched a movie! I will thoroughly miss this family.

Going forward I will read anything this woman writes, knowing that as the book finishes I will be reading or listening thinking noooo I’m just not ready to say goodbye yet. Now THAT. That is the sign of a great book, and what I hope will happen every time I open a new one but, unfortunately, usually doesn’t.

Thank you SO much to Macmillan Audio, Netgalley, and Celadon Books for the ARC and ALC in exchange for an honest review.