‘One day you’ll look back and realise how hard it was, and just how well you did’
Charlie Mackesy’s four unlikely friends are wandering through the wilds again. They’re not sure what they are looking for. They do know that life can be difficult, but that they love each other, and cake is often the answer.
When the dark clouds come, can the boy remember what he needs to get through the storm?
The hugely anticipated new book from Charlie Mackesy, revisiting the much-loved world of The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse – the bestselling adult non-fiction book of all time, with over ten million readers around the world.
Eight writers. Sixteen unforgettable stories. Translated from Irish for the first time.
Stories from Belfast to Kerry, from the immigrant experience to the weight of tradition, these voices refuse easy comfort. They explore the raw territories of motherhood and loss, desire and betrayal and the clash between old certainties and new realities. A tattooist claims his lover's skin. A widow faces an impossible choice about her disabled son. Birds of prey stalk through dreams of environmental catastrophe.
Here is family in all its beautiful, terrible complexity — the bonds that sustain us, the ones that suffocate, the love that heals and the secrets that destroy.
Bold, unflinching, and impossible to ignore, Stepsisters showcases the depth and power of contemporary Irish women's writing.
Featuring stories from Éithne Ní Ghallchobhair, Deirdre Brennan, Róise Ní Bhaoill, Biddy Jenkinson, Katherine Duffy and Réaltán Ní Leannáin.