In her debut novel, "Nesting," Roisin O'Donnell explores the harrowing story of Ciara Fay, who escapes an abusive relationship with her two small children amid Dublin's housing crisis. As Ciara attempts to seek safety, she faces numerous obstacles including emotional manipulation from her estranged husband Ryan and a broken social care system. Stranded in a docklands hotel transformed into a makeshift shelter, Ciara's plight sheds light on systemic issues of domestic abuse and the challenges many like her face in seeking refuge and independence.
To the casual onlooker, husband Ryan is a well-dressed, mass-attending civil servant, but over the course of their five-year marriage he has subjected Ciara to relentless emotional abuse and more, isolating her from friends.
Temporary accommodation, she's told, but weeks stretch into months and, with her due date nearing, Ryan continues to bombard her with promises and threats.
There's a reason birds fledge as soon as they're able, a man at the wildlife sanctuary informs Ciara.
O'Donnell has already won awards for her short stories, and there's a spare, compressed intensity to her prose here that sharpens the immediacy of Ciara's plight.
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