{"product_id":"the-irish-goodbye-by-beth-ann-fennelly-9781324117407","title":"The Irish Goodbye","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhat can we learn from an ordinary life observed with extraordinary skill? In \u003cem\u003eThe Irish Goodbye\u003c\/em\u003e, Beth Ann Fennelly writes of the small moments that shape a life, whether moving or perplexing or troubling or gladdening, in the process dignifying the diminutive through the act of attention. Fennelly explores her roles as a friend, wife, mother, and daughter, documenting a brush with an old flame or the devastating death of her sister in crystalline, precise sentences.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe longer essays concern Fennelly's relationships—with a beloved mother-in-law, a decades-long friendship between five former college roommates, and an artist who paints a series of nude portraits in Fennelly's town, for which she poses. Interspersed between these longer memoirs are sections of flash nonfiction, a form Fennelly innovated in the genre-defying \u003cem\u003eHeating \u0026amp; Cooling\u003c\/em\u003e. With dazzling verve and wit, they capture the interstitial interactions—encounters with strangers, quirky observations, unexpected flights of fancy—that make up a richly lived life.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Irish Goodbye\u003c\/em\u003e offers a rare pleasure: intimacy. With emotional clarity and nimble prose, Fennelly invites readers to share her affirming worldview—one in which even our smallest interactions are rife with possibility.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Unknown","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47562870980844,"sku":"9781324117407","price":57.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9781324117407-the-irish-goodbye.jpg?v=1776989148","url":"https:\/\/bookhero.co.nz\/products\/the-irish-goodbye-by-beth-ann-fennelly-9781324117407","provider":"Book Hero","version":"1.0","type":"link"}