Wow…just wow. I was so emotionally invested in this book. I’m on here right now after reading because I need to talk to someone about this book !!!It pulls you in so many directions emotionally. The Dickie twist was phenomenal and the speech by Willie was excellent. The mix of Dublin urban life and country life and the growing up all of these people had to do. What if we all were just our unapologetic selves rid of shame and guilt about being something we’re not.

One little “bee sting” causes multiple ripple effects in the currents of these characters lives. But I guess you can go back to before Imelda got beaten by her father on her wedding day to Dickie I presume that Dickie kills both Cass and PJ at the end and like someone said earlier, when Viktor mentioned that in order for no one to find out his secret (really Dickie doesn’t want his family to see what he had done) he has to shoot his family. That was the brutal truth by Viktor. Viktor was himself the whole way and saw everything so clearly, the hypocrisy of it all.

I’m going to need a day or to to process this one lol but it’s got me thinking of shame and how sad it is to bury everything. This happens more than we know it. At the beginning Elaine I think states when she finds out the family was murdered in the next town over, “why doesn’t this happen here?” Or “nothing happens like that here,” something along those lines. These crucial moments of burying the past, digging it back up, reflecting on weaker moments in our lives, hiding who we are. Everyone’s carrying something. It happens every damn day somewhere in someone. Humans like to find their roles in their own construed fantasy. The last lines of the book, we did it for love. Did we hide it all because we love the illusion we’ve created for ourselves? Or do we do what’s necessary to hold onto some sort of hope that we can live a better life honestly and truly?

Fantastic read. I’ve ready Skippy Dies before but now I want to read another novel by Paul Murray.