The Sisters at the convent are powerful and it’s better not to cross them. For Eileen, it’s better not to stick your nose where it doesn’t belong. He knows he could have ended in the system. It was the first of April, 1946, and some said the boy would turn out to be a fool.īill’s and his mother’s life wouldn’t have turned out so well without Mrs Wilson. On the morning Furlong was born, it was Mrs Wilson who had his mother taken into hospital, and had them brought home. When his mother’s trouble became known, and her people made it clear that they’d have no more to do with her, Mrs Wilson, instead of giving his mother her walking papers, told her she should stay on, and keep her work. His mother, at the age of sixteen, had fallen pregnant while working as a domestic for Mrs Wilson, the Protestant widow who lived in the big house a few miles outside of town. Indeed, Bill’s mother was a single mum, a perfect candidate for the Magdalene system.įurlong had come from nothing. He’s deeply moved and can’t turn a blind eye to this young woman’s predicament. One day, Bill finds a girl hidden in the convent’s coal shed who asks him about her baby.

They were workhouses with terrible living conditions. In Ireland, they lasted from 1765 to 1998 according to Wikipedia and were run by the Catholic Church with the approval of the Irish government. The Magdalen Asylums were convents where “fallen” girls were sent and worked for their keep as laundresses. His days are long as he delivers coal supplies to his clients before the holidays.Īmong Bill’s clients is the local Magdalene Asylum. He runs his company while his wife Eileen runs the house and takes care of their five children. It’s a busy time for Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man. Small Things Like These is set in New Ross, Ireland, in the weeks before Christmas. I didn’t like Foster that much when I read it and never tried another book by Claire Keegan after. I owe Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan to my KUBE libraire.

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