Heather Aimee O’Neill’s The Irish Goodbye is the latest pick for Jenna Bush Hager’s Today show book club.
O’Neill’s debut novel, scheduled for publication next Tuesday by Henry Holt, follows three sisters who reunite for Thanksgiving at their Long Island family home years after the suicide of their brother. A critic for Kirkus wrote of the book, “Fans of writers from Maeve Binchy to Alice McDermott to J. Courtney Sullivan will relish this big-hearted novel.”
Hager announced the selection on the morning show, saying, “It’s an extraordinary book about the power of family and sisterhood, and it shows how the ripples of loss and grief can shape even our closest relationships, but it’s also hilarious and juicy.”
O’Neill told Today.com that the novel originated as a story about the 9/11 attacks.
“It began to shift, and incorporated these other tragedies into the book, but it was still a way for me to write about grief,” she said. “I knew I wanted to write about sisters and the impact that it had on this unit of sisters.”
She said her own sisters were wary when they learned about the plot of the novel.
“I also grew up in an Irish Catholic family on the water, but when my family found out what the story was about, my sisters were really nervous,” she said. “I was like, ‘Trust me, it’s not about us.’”
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
