Amazing that this is a debut! An emotive read exploring love and loss from different perspectives, places, and points in time.

I loved the way this novel was structured, the story broken into pieces for the reader to put together as the novel progressed. My only criticism was that I felt a little too much was revealed at the end; the reader knew the full story and that was enough, without all characters needing to know everything too.

Interested to see the success of this novel following publication. Thank you to Penguin General UK via NetGalley for the ARC!

Wow. This was unexpected, and unique although not entirely in a good way! The first section was wonderful and totally drew me in, however I found other sections of the book disjointed and the game subplot did not fulfil it's early promise. Mixed feelings

A family saga which gripped my heart and refused to let go.

The novel opens with Cora, a teenage girl who has just found out that her father has been killed in the September 11 attacks. Her mother having already died, she has now been rendered an orphan, and has received a letter from her mother's sister in Ireland, inviting Cora to live with her.

From there, we go back in time to the 70s, to Cora's mother Maire and her sister Roisin. Of all the compelling protagonists (Cora, Maire, Roisin and, later, Cora's daughter Lyca) it's Roisin who touched me the most. At her heart, she is simply a good girl who wants to do right by her family and herself. Maire bullies her and later takes up with a young man named Michael, whose presence changes Roisin's fate as well.

Next, we come to Maire's story, ass he arrives in New York to study. This aspect of the novel is unremittingly tragic. Three men enter Maire's life, one after the other, sending a wrecking ball through her life. This was the hardest section in the book for me, and the author handles issues of consent so sensitively. We are also made privy to the situation back home in Ireland, as Roisin and Michael struggle to navigate through a life without Maire.

After this, we lurch forward to the 2010s for our final protagonist, Lyca, who is looking back and trying to figure out what really happened to her mother, grandmother and great-aunt, and the impact this has had on her life. Without spoiling too much, this focusses very much on the history of reproductive rights in Ireland.

As a woman, this novel will make you angry. The injustices that befall these women simply for the fact that they are female will boil your blood. But this will also leave you with hope and belief in the strength women gain from themselves and with each other.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and Penguin General UK for the ARC!

An interesting read. A lot of concentration needed as there are a lot of characters and different eras covered. New York features a lot including 9/11..

This is a really interesting story. It follows a number of characters and switches between different time periods. It feels a bit disjointed but that actually works really well as no one in the book really has the full story themselves.
It ranges between New York and Ireland and across generations.
It's about women and families and secrets.

Confessions is the intergenerational story of women interweaved with a fictional game.
The story moves between Donegal, New York and Burtonport and between women of the same family.
Content warning: September 11 is mentioned a few times.
My favourite storyline was the storyline in 1974 set in Donegal.
Lyca’s discoveries were curious to follow, overall.
Plot: 4 stars
Prose: 3.5 stars
Characterisation: 4 stars
Overall, I recommend this book especially because of the settings and the multidimensional characters.

The blurb for Catherine Airey’s Confessions promises an involving tale of two Irish sisters, one of whom emigrates to New York to take up an art school scholarship ticking two of my literary boxes. Máire and Rósín’s stories span several decades beginning in the 1970s when they’re growing up in an Irish village not far from the house which one will paint and the other will eventually live in, making it the setting for a choose-your-own-adventure computer video game.
It opens in 2001 with Máire’s daughter before winding back to her sister Rósín in the ‘70s and ending with Máire’s granddaughter in 2023 after passing the narrative baton back and forth. Each section is prefaced with a scenario from Scream School, the computer video game which Rósín wrote based on the stories she and her sister wove around the house they were fascinated by. Airey smoothly unfolds this complicated, puzzle of a story, pieces of which click satisfyingly into place, largely through the distinctive voices of its female characters, exploring a multitude of themes along the way. To say more about the plot would be to ruin it. There’s a coincidence that may irritate some, but I was so immersed by then that I was more than happy to continue the ride. A long, intricately plotted, luxurious read, perfect for long evenings in January when it’s due to be published

Very excited for this beautiful generational book and getting to read and experience the richness of these women’s stories. I apologize due to an unexpected severe health issue I’m slowly catching up on reviews, but will be offering a much more detailed review in the near future. I am honored and privileged to have the opportunity to read this book and share my thoughts as well as bring it to readers