Irish Times
‘Vivid and powerful, Beatrice is a novel told in gleaming moments, like a string of pearls brought one by one out of the dark. It has the compelling power of a detective story, following a trail of ghosts into the past’
Niall Williams
Also by Noëlle Harrison
Beatrice
A Small Part of Me
I Remember
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thank you to Marianne Gunn O’Connor, my very special agent, to Vicki Satlow, my other very special agent, and to Pat Lynch, Marianne’s indispensable assistant. Thank you to my wonderful editor Imogen Taylor, and to her assistants Thalia Suzuma and Trisha Jackson. Thank you to Dave Adamson, Chloe Healy and all at Pan Macmillan. Thanks to Joy Terekiev and Cristiana Moroni at Mondadori, and to Barbara Heinzius at Random House.
Thank you to my first readers and good friends Kate Bootle, Monica McInerney, Jo Southall, Donna Ansley, Ciara O’Hara, Miriam McCabe, Sinéad Nic Coitir, Sally Nelson, Maura McInerney and Jason Irrgang, all of whom gave me valuable feedback at different stages of the book’s development.
Thank you to Bernie McCabe for talking to me about life in Cavan during the Emergency, and to Bernie Kellett for her advice on the fashion of the period.
A very special acknowledgment to my darling departed mother Claire Davies, her sisters Ruth Blishen & Joyce D’Silva, her late brother John Blake Kelly, and her late sister Bán Hanlon, whose writings on the history of our family provided me with many ideas.
Thank you to Carol O’Connor for creative inspiration, and to Agata, Roberto and Gaia Purini in Milan.
Thank you to my old Latin teacher Miss Wilcox, who instilled in me a lifelong passion for ancient Rome.
Thank you to Fintan Blake Kelly, Barry Ansley, Page Allen, Jenny Brady, Jill Igoe, Synnøve and Hanna Bakke, Therese Dalton, Bernie McGrath, Tanja and Kathrin Eigendorf, Corey Ansley and Helena Goode.
First published 2009 by Macmillan
This edition published 2010 by Pan Books
an imprint of Pan Macmillan
This electronic edition published 2010 by Pan Books
an imprint of Pan Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London N1 9RR
Basingstoke and Oxford
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-0-330-52260-1 PDF
ISBN 978-0-330-46874-9 EPUB
Copyright © Noëlle Harrison 2009
The right of Noëlle Harrison to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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