This Is Happiness by Niall Williams

By Céline | November 4, 2025

Oh, how I loved this book! My primary interest in fiction is a sense of place, and this novel explores place in a variety of ways. It’s set in the Irish village of Faha in County Clare, which was also featured in Niall Williams’ previous novel, “History of the Rain” (longlisted for the 2014 Man Booker…

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Sylvestor Manor

By Céline | November 3, 2025

Shelter Island, New York I’ve been especially eager to visit Shelter Island’s Sylvester Manor since I began writing my current novel, which has a focus on the slave trade in the northeast. The lands of Sylvester Manor were home for millennia to indigenous Manhansett People, then owned by an Anglo Dutch sugar consortium to run…

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