In fiction, deathbed vigils have a way of luring prodigal sons and daughters home, and so it is with Beth in Catherine Dunne's superb book The Walled Garden. Years before she fled from her down-at-heel grey childhood and the constant air of disappointment that surrounded her widowed mother by escaping to London as soon as the ink on her Leaving Cert papers was dry. Now her mother Alice has suffered a stroke that is destined to prove fatal, and Beth comes home to the same house in the northside Dublin suburb to be at the bedside, along with her solid and faithful brother James. Even in her comatose state, Alice exerts her power through a series of letters she wrote to her children in her last months. The story traces the mother/daughter relationship in all its misunderstandings, stubbornness and regrets, and explores the complex dynamics that drive family relationships. Dunne is an extraordinarily evocative storyteller and this is her third novel. The wonder is why this Irish writer is not better known here. She certainly deserves to be.
