Reviewed by Patricia Simms-Reeve
The word ‘Nesting’ may conjure up an image of a happy young woman, eagerly awaiting the birth of her baby by preparing her home with all the touches that will create the best environment for the new arrival.
Roisín O’Donnell’s novel, in stark contrast to the conventional notion of nesting, is a stunning debut. She handles a challenging subject with a consummate skill. Ciara, married to Ryan, has two small daughters, and is expecting a third baby.
Raised by a single mother in the Midlands, she hastily married a handsome, charming Irishman and goes to live in Ireland. Her happiness is short-lived and she soon finds that she is living with a controlling, cruel husband who verbally attacks her on any pretext he can create. As a survival tactic she has no choice but to leave. Two years down the track, she summons the courage to do this.
This lasts merely two weeks and he virtually compels her to return to their Dublin house.
The book opens with it being obvious that life is impossible for her, yet again, as she is berated constantly and her confidence undermined. At times she is terrified. In her early pregnancy, her ‘nesting’ is tragically remote from what it should have been. She does not know which way is forward and which is back. Once more, she packs the car and takes the girls to escape this impossible situation.
The plight of a young mother with no home, little finance and no family or friends close by springs to life. Her battle reads as a gripping thriller. Roisin O’Donnell’s characters are achingly real, particularly Ciara and Ryan. Their battles and confrontations are unrelenting as she attempts to find a better life for her children and herself with her husband stopping just short of physical violence to thwart her every attempt. Their verbal exchanges are horrifying in the depiction of a man irrationally attempting to emotionally shatter his wife.
His ‘rescue’ of a fledgling crow is a strangely unsettling segment of the book. Although he is fighting for custody of the children, it is obvious he is incapable of caring for a vulnerable bird, let alone small children.
Difficulties constantly arise but it with steady courage and determination Ciara struggles on.
Along the way, difficulties arise that she tackles with the help of another homeless mother, a kind Portuguese student, Diago, and a sister who distraught by her inability to be by her side. All this creates additional stresses. The prose is very fine, conveying an emotional charge that throbs with its gripping details. So vivid is this that it reads like a documentary account of the extreme difficulties faced when a young and vulnerable wife with little children needs to break free from an abusive relationship.
The suspense is the impetus that carries the reader to discover the outcome. The author has created an immense feeling of connectedness wanting to know the fate of Ciara and her children.
Clearly and beautifully, ‘Nesting’ demonstrates that emotional abuse is a crime scene without any visible evidence but leaves deep emotional scars.
Women who try to leave a bad relationship face enormous consequences and obstacles. This is an uneasy subject for a novel and often is disturbing to read of this especially as we consider how many women are victims trapped by partners in a frightening relationship.
Roisín O’Donnell has written a powerful book that brings insight and admiration for the homeless mothers like Ciara, and that in itself is a brilliant accomplishment.
Nesting
[2025]
by Roisín O’Donnell
Scribner
ISBN 978 176142 323 9
$34.99; 372pp