Barry, Sebastian

"Irishman Jack McNulty is a "temporary gentleman"--an Irishman whose commission in the British army in World War II was never permanent. Sitting in his lodgings in Accra, Ghana, in 1957,he's writing the story of his life with desperate urgency. He cannot take one step further without examining all the extraordinary events that he has seen. A lifetime of war and world travel--as a soldier in World War II, an engineer, a UN observer--has brought him to this point. But the memory that weighs heaviest on his heart is that of the beautiful Mai Kirwan, and their tempestuous, heartbreaking marriage. Mai was once the great beauty of Sligo, a magnetic yet unstable woman who, after sharing a life with Jack, gradually slipped from his grasp"--Provided by publisher.

Thomas McNulty, aged barely seventeen and having fled the Great Famine in Ireland, signs up for the U.S. Army in the 1850s. With his brother in arms, John Cole, Thomas goes on to fight in the Indian Wars--against the Sioux and the Yurok--and, ultimately, the Civil War. Orphans of terrible hardships themselves, the men find these days to be vivid and alive, despite the horrors they see and are complicit in.

Facing her 100th birthday Roseanne McNulty has decided to record her past from inside a mental hospital, and while the facility is scheduled to close, Dr. Grene takes an interest in Roseanne to determine if she is capable of reentering society, but when a document -- written by a local priest -- surfaces, it offers a history different from the one Roseanne offers.

Annie Dunne and her cousin Sarah live and work on a small farm in a remote Irish village, where a calmer sense of life prevails, but when Annie agrees to watch her nephew's two children for the summer, her peaceful life is turned upside-down and Annie begins to learn that sometimes change is a good thing.

Facing her 100th birthday Roseanne McNulty has decided to record her past from inside a mental hospital, and while the facility is scheduled to close, Dr. Grene takes an interest in Roseanne to determine if she is capable of reentering society, but when a document -- written by a local priest -- surfaces, it offers a history different from the one Roseanne offers.