Whitethorn Woods (Binchy)

Whitethorn Woods
Maeve Binchy, 2007
Knopf Doubleday
368 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780307455239

Summary
When a new highway threatens to bypass the town of Rossmore and cut through Whitethorn Woods, everyone has a passionate opinion about whether the town will benefit or suffer.

But young Father Flynn is most concerned with the fate of St. Ann’s Well, which is set at the edge of the woods and slated for destruction. People have been coming to St. Ann’s for generations to share their dreams and fears, and speak their prayers. Some believe it to be a place of true spiritual power, demanding protection; others think it’s a mere magnet for superstitions, easily sacrificed.

Father Flynn listens to all those caught up in the conflict, as the men and women of Whitethorn Woods must decide between the traditions of the past and the promises of the future. (From the publisher.)

Author Bio 
• Birth—May 28, 1940
• Where—Dalkey (outside Dublin), Ireland
• Death—July 30, 2012
• Where—Dalkey, Ireland
• Education—B.A., University College, Dublin
• Awards—see below

Maeve Binchy Snell was an Irish novelist, playwright, short story writer, columnist, and speaker. She is best known for her humorous take on small-town life in Ireland, her descriptive characters, her interest in human nature and her often clever surprise endings. Her novels, which were translated into 37 languages, sold more than 40 million copies worldwide, and her death, announced by Vincent Browne on Irish television late on 30 July 2012, was mourned as the passing of Ireland's best-loved and most recognisable writer.

Her books have outsold those of other Irish writers such as Oscar Wilde, James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, W. B. Yeats, Seamus Heaney, Edna O'Brien and Roddy Doyle. She cracked the U.S. market, featuring on the New York Times best-seller list and in Oprah's Book Club. Recognised for her "total absence of malice" and generosity to other writers, she finished ahead of Jane Austen, Charles Dickens and Stephen King in a 2000 poll for World Book Day.

Early life
Binchy was born in Dalkey, County Dublin (modern-day Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown), Ireland, the oldest child of four. Her siblings include one brother, William Binchy, Regius Professor of Laws at Trinity College, Dublin, and two sisters: Renie (who predeceased Binchy) and Joan Ryan. Her uncle was the historian D. A. Binchy (1899–1989). Educated at the Holy Child Convent in Killiney and University College Dublin (where she earned a bachelor's degree in history), she worked as a teacher of French, Latin, and history at various girls' schools, then a journalist at the Irish Times, and later became a writer of novels, short stories, and dramatic works.

In 1968, her mother died of cancer aged 57. After Binchy's father died in 1971, she sold the family house and moved to a bedsit in Dublin.

Israel
Her parents were Catholics and Binchy attended a convent school.[12] However, a trip to Israel profoundly affected both her career and her faith. As she confided in a Q&A with Vulture:

In 1963, I worked in a Jewish school in Dublin, teaching French with an Irish accent to kids, primarily Lithuanians. The parents there gave me a trip to Israel as a present. I had no money, so I went and worked in a kibbutz — plucking chickens, picking oranges. My parents were very nervous; here I was going out to the Middle East by myself. I wrote to them regularly, telling them about the kibbutz. My father and mother sent my letters to a newspaper, which published them. So I thought, It’s not so hard to be a writer. Just write a letter home. After that, I started writing other travel articles.

Additionally, one Sunday, attempting to locate where the Last Supper is supposed to have occurred, she climbed a mountainside to a cavern guarded by a Brooklyn-born Israeli soldier. She wept with despair. The soldier asked, “What’ya expect, ma’am—a Renaissance table set for 13?” She replied, “Yes! That’s just what I did expect.” Binchy was no longer a Catholic.

Marriage
Binchy, described as "six feet tall, rather stout, and garrulous", confided to Gay Byrne of the Late Late Show that, growing up in Dalkey, she never felt herself to be attractive; "as a plump girl I didn't start on an even footing to everyone else", she shared. After her mother's death, she expected to a lead a life of spinsterhood, or as she expressed: "I expected I would live at home, as I always did." She continued, "I felt very lonely, the others all had a love waiting for them and I didn't."

She ultimately encountered the love of her life, however; when recording a piece for Woman's Hour in London, she met children's author Gordon Snell, then a freelance producer with the BBC. Their friendship blossomed into a cross-border romance, with her in Ireland and him in London, until she eventually secured a job in London through the Irish Times. She and Snell married in 1977 and after living in London for a time, moved to Ireland. They lived together in Dalkey, not far from where she had grown up, until Binchy's death. She told the Irish Times:

[A] writer, a man I loved and he loved me and we got married and it was great and is still great. He believed I could do anything, just as my parents had believed all those years ago, and I started to write fiction and that took off fine. And he loved Ireland, and the fax was invented so we writers could live anywhere we liked, instead of living in London near publishers.

Ill health...and death
In 2002, Binchy "suffered a health crisis related to a heart condition", which inspired her to write Heart and Soul. The book about (what Binchy terms) "a heart failure clinic" in Dublin and the people involved with it, reflects many of her own experiences and observations in the hospital.

Towards the end of her life, Binchy had the following message on her official website: "My health isn't so good these days and I can't travel around to meet people the way I used to. But I'm always delighted to hear from readers, even if it takes me a while to reply."

She suffered with severe arthritis, which left her in constant pain. As a result of the arthritis she had a hip operation.

Binchy died on 30 July 2012 after a short illness. She was 72.] Gordon was by her side when she died in a Dublin hospital. Immediate media reports described Binchy as "beloved", "Ireland's most well-known novelist" and the "best-loved writer of her generation". Fellow writers mourned their loss, including Ian Rankin, Jilly Cooper, Anne Rice, and Jeffrey Archer. Politicians also paid tribute. President Michael D. Higgins stated: "Our country mourns." Taoiseach Enda Kenny said, “Today we have lost a national treasure.” Minister of State for Disability, Equality and Mental Health Kathleen Lynch, appearing as a guest on Tonight with Vincent Browne, said Binchy was, for her money, as worthy an Irish writer as James Joyce or Oscar Wilde, and praised her for selling so many more books than they managed.

In the days after her death tributes were published from such writers as John Banville, Roddy Doyle, and Colm Tóibín. Banville contrasted Binchy with Gore Vidal, who died the day after her, observing that Vidal "used to say that it was not enough for him to succeed, but others must fail. Maeve wanted everyone to be a success." Numerous tributes appeared in publications on both sides of the Atlantic, including the Guardian and CBC News.

Shortly before her death, Binchy told the Irish Times:

I don't have any regrets about any roads I didn't take. Everything went well, and I think that's been a help because I can look back, and I do get great pleasure out of looking back ... I've been very lucky and I have a happy old age with good family and friends still around.

Just before dying, she read her latest short story at the Dalkey Book Festival.

She once said she would like to die "... on my 100th birthday, piloting Gordon and myself into the side of a mountain." She was cremated that Friday in Mount Jerome. It was a simple ceremony, as she had requested.

Journalism
The New York Times reports: Binchy's "writing career began by accident in the early 1960s, after she spent time on a kibbutz in Israel. Her father was so taken with her letters home that "he cut off the ‘Dear Daddy’ bits,” Ms. Binchy later recounted, and sent them to an Irish newspaper, which published them." Donal Lynch observed of her first paying journalism role: the Irish Independent "was impressed enough to commission her, paying her £16, which was then a week-and-a-half's salary for her."

In 1968, Binchy joined the staff at the Irish Times, and worked there as a writer, columnist, the first Women's Page editor then the London editor, later reporting for the paper from London before returning to Ireland.

Binchy's first published book is a compilation of her newspaper articles titled My First Book. Published in 1970, it is now out of print. As Binchy's bio posted at Read Ireland describes: "The Dublin section of the book contains insightful case histories that prefigure her novelist's interest in character. The rest of the book is mainly humorous, and particularly droll is her account of a skiing holiday, 'I Was a Winter Sport.'"

Literary works
In all, Binchy published 16 novels, four short-story collections, a play and a novella. Her literary career began with two books of short stories: Central Line (1978) and Victoria Line (1980). She published her debut novel Light a Penny Candle in 1982. In 1983, it sold for the largest sum ever paid for a first novel: £52,000. The timing was fortuitous, as Binchy and her husband were two months behind with the mortgage at the time. However, the prolific Binchy—who joked that she could write as fast as she could talk—ultimately became one of Ireland's richest women.

Her first book was rejected five times. She would later describe these rejections as "a slap in the face [...] It's like if you don't go to a dance you can never be rejected but you'll never get to dance either".

Most of Binchy's stories are set in Ireland, dealing with the tensions between urban and rural life, the contrasts between England and Ireland, and the dramatic changes in Ireland between World War II and the present day. Her books were translated into 37 languages.

While some of Binchy's novels are complete stories (Circle of Friends, Light a Penny Candle), many others revolve around a cast of interrelated characters (The Copper Beech, Silver Wedding, The Lilac Bus, Evening Class, and Heart and Soul). Her later novels, Evening Class, Scarlet Feather, Quentins, and Tara Road, feature a cast of recurring characters.

Binchy announced in 2000 that she would not tour any more of her novels, but would instead be devoting her time to other activities and to her husband, Gordon Snell. Five further novels were published before her death—Quentins (2002), Nights of Rain and Stars (2004), Whitethorn Woods (2006), Heart and Soul (2008), and Minding Frankie (2010). Her final work, A Week in Winter, was published posthumously in 2012.

Binchy wrote several dramas specifically for radio and the silver screen. Additionally, several of her novels and short stories were adapted for radio, film, and television.

Awards and honours

• In 1978, Binchy won a Jacob's Award for her RTÉ play, Deeply Regretted By. A second award went to the lead actor, Donall Farmer.
• A 1993 photograph of her by Richard Whitehead belongs to the collection of the National Portrait Gallery (London) and a painting of her by Maeve McCarthy, commissioned in 2005, is on display in the National Gallery of Ireland.
• In 1999, she received the British Book Award for Lifetime Achievement.
• In 2000, she received a People of the Year Award.
• In 2001, Scarlet Feather won the W H Smith Book Award for Fiction, defeating works by Joanna Trollope and then reigning Booker winner Margaret Atwood, amongst other contenders.
• In 2007, she received the Irish PEN Award, joining such luminaries as John B. Keane, Brian Friel, Edna O'Brien, William Trevor, John McGahern and Seamus Heaney.
• In 2010, she received a lifetime achievement award from the Irish Book Awards.
• In 2012, she received an Irish Book Award in the "Irish Popular Fiction Book" category for A Week in Winter.
• There have been posthumous proposals to name a new Liffey crossing Binchy Bridge in memory of the writer Other writers to have Dublin bridges named after them include Beckett, Joyce and O'Casey.
• In 2012 a new garden behind the Dalkey Library in County Dublin was dedicated in memory of Binchy. (Author bio adapted from Wikipedia.)

Book Reviews
A proposed highway near the Irish town of Rossmore will mean the destruction of St. Ann's Well, a shrine in Whitethorn Woods thought to deliver healing, husbands and other miracles. The shrine resides in the parish of Fr. Brian Flynn, curate of St. Augustine's. As a fracas erupts between shrine skeptics who want the highway and shrine believers who want the shrine preserved, Flynn, unsure of where he stands on the issue and questioning his place in an increasingly secular Ireland, goes to the shrine and prays that he might "hear the voices that have come to you and know who these people are." Binchy (Tara Road) goes on to deliver just that: a panoply of prosaic but richly drawn first-person characters, such as Neddy Nolan, a not-so-simple simpleton; 60-something Vera, who finds love on a singles trip meant for those much younger; and unassuming antiques magnate James, whose wife of 26 years is dying. Stories of greed, infidelity, mental illness, incest, the joys of being single, the struggles of modern career women, alcoholism, and the heartbreak of parenting span generations, simply and poignantly. Binchy takes it all in and orchestrates the whole masterfully.
Publishers Weekly


In classic Binchy style (Nights of the Rain and Stars), many diverse characters tell their own, sometimes overlapping, stories in separate chapters, beginning and ending with Catholic priest Brian Flynn in the small Irish town of Rossmore. Teenaged to elderly, rich to poor, good to bad, all characters have some connection, however slight, to Rossmore, where controversy is brewing over a proposed highway bypass. The new road would run right through the woods surrounding the cave that houses St. Ann's Well, an unofficial shrine that attracts prayerful petitioners and is a thorn in Father Flynn's side. After the unprincipled obliviously reveal their own moral failings in their own words, readers will want to call their mothers or spend time with elderly relatives to be more like the decent, unassuming, author-approved characters, or at least more like those who manage a change of heart before the end. An enjoyable peek into other people's thoughts, this new novel by a beloved author will make a good book group choice. An essential purchase for any women's fiction collection.
Laurie A. Cavanaugh - Library Journal


Inventively and intricately weaving a series of linked vignettes, Binchy astounds with the versatility of the supplicants' voices, from the diabolical machinations of a mother whose daughter has committed murder to the sad serenity of another whose child was kidnapped decades earlier. Binchy is at her best in this tender yet potent tale of a traditional land and people threatened and challenged by the forces of change. —Carol Haggas
Booklist


Binchy (Quentins, 2002, etc.) inserts questions of faith into her usual romantic braid of multiple storylines, in this case concerning the troubled residents, former residents and descendents of residents of an Irish town where an obscure shrine faces demolition. Father Brian Flynn, his commitment to the priesthood already shaky, is furious at the superstitious faith people place in the shrine at St. Ann's Well outside Rossmore, but after visiting the shrine himself, he vows to hear and help his parishioners himself. Then a proposed new highway threatens to run right through the site of the well. The efforts of Father Flynn and his congregants, particularly the saintly Neddy Nolan, whose practical wisdom has been mislabeled as simpleminded, to resolve the highway dilemma form the plot that snakes around a slew of subplots. These are often fully realized stories that stand on their own. Some of the characters actually visit the well, like the two pairs of lovers who together find a perfect living arrangement thanks to the shrine, or like Father Flynn's sister Judy, who returns home to pray for a husband. Others, like the insane Becca, who arranges for the murder of her romantic rival, and her mother, who sells Becca's story to the tabloids, live in Rossmore but pointedly do not visit the shrine. The majority share only a geographical connection to Rossmore, as in the case of Emer and Ken. Although their story smacks of heavenly intervention, the intermediary who kindles Emer and Ken's romance is a gallant cab driver, not St. Ann. In Binchy's world, well-meaning characters find happiness while an ungrateful son or an adulterous husband can expect comeuppance. Her sentimental morality may be predictable, but Binchy's lilting Irish zest is undeniably addictive.
Kirkus Reviews

Discussion Questions
1. Discuss the observations Father Flynn makes about religion in the first chapter. Although his concerns and frustrations are specific to the Catholic Church, what do they reveal about the struggles clergy of every religion face today? Beyond preserving religious traditions and rites (“people still had to be baptized, given first Communion, have their confessions heard; they needed to be married and buried” [p. 6]), do religious institutions have a meaningful role to play in the twenty-first century? If so, are they fulfilling this role?

2. Neddy Nolan begins his narrative by saying, “nobody expects too much from Soft Neddy so I more or less get away with my way of looking at things” [p. 24]. How do the various stories he tells about himself—from the incident with Nora to his life in London and his marriage to Clare—reflect the contrast between the perceptions of others and Neddy’s own point of view? What advantages does his apparent lack of sophistication give him?

3. In describing her childhood, Clare says, “I was both proud and ashamed when I was a schoolgirl. Proud that I was able to stay out of my uncle’s messy clutches. And ashamed because I came from a family that wouldn’t look after me but left me to fight my own battles against things I didn’t understand” [p. 40]. Do you think this reaction is common among abused children? How does the combination of fear and pride shape Clare, both as a child and as a young woman out on her own?

4. The stories of Vera and Sharon provide a lighthearted look at love and romance through the perspectives of two generations. How does Binchy bring to life the idiosyncrasies of love at different stages in our lives?
In what ways do the stories speak to the timeless needs, desires, and hopes that underlie the search for love?

5. Friendship takes center stage in “Malka” and “Rivka.” Why has Binchy chosen Israel, a setting far from home for both protagonists, as the meeting place for the women? Would these two women have become friends in either Ireland or America, their respective homelands? What role do less-than-perfect marriages play in their deep attachment to and dependence on each other? Do you agree with Rivka’s opinion that “friendship was better than love in a way, it was more generous” [p. 98]?

6. What was your initial reaction to “Becca”? Were you surprised to come upon this chilling story? Does the portrait of Gabrielle change your understanding of Becca’s horrific act [pp. 125–138]? What do the two stories represent in terms of the themes of the novel and the fictional world Binchy is creating?

7. In “Barbara” and “Someone from Dad’s Office,” Binchy explores the transformations that occur when people see one another in unfamiliar contexts. What factors shape the assumptions Barbara and her coworkers make about one another in the office? What parallels exist between the way the narrator views his father in “Someone from Dad’s Office”and the way adults form their opinions in “Barbara”? Do you think the new relationships among the characters will last, or will the old patterns inevitably reemerge?

8. “Dr. Dermot” and “Chester’s Plan” focus on the transition from the past to the present (and the future), and its impact on individuals and communities. What specific details and observations in the stories highlight common reactions to change and progress? Discuss, for example, how the conflict between Dr. Dermot and Dr. White represents more than the clash of two personalities and two different styles of practicing medicine. In what ways does Chester Kovac epitomize the image that people in other countries have of Americans and how this image affects his interactions with the local population?

9. What do Helen’s and James’s accounts reveal about the nature of marriage and the ties that bind people together? How does Binchy treat Helen’s act of desperation and its repercussions? Does she make moral judgments, or does she leave this up to the reader?

10. June and Lucky are the youngest narrators in Whitethorn Woods. What do their perspectives reflect about the significance of roots and of family in contemporary times? What insights do they offer into the complicated terrain of mother-daughter relationships?

11. Binchy paints a wry portrait of courtship in “Emer” and “Hugo.” What distinguishes Binchy’s take on modern romance from the stories told in popular movies, on television, and in “chick-lit” novels? In what ways are the characters, and the way the plot unfolds, reminiscent of traditional fairy tales?

12. What expectations and assumptions—emotional, psychological, and societal—lie at the heart of the relationship between Pearl and her adult children? Is Pearl’s willingness to make excuses for her children naïve, or does it reflect a universal maternal instinct? What does it say about John and Amy that they ignore or are ashamed of their roots?  And what does it reveal about Linda’s character that she breaks up with John?  What do the characters’ self-deceptions and pretenses demonstrate about family dynamics in general?

13. Poppy’s tale and her sister’s complementary account deal with the same, straightforward “facts,” but make very different impressions on the reader. At the conclusion of her story, Jane asks, “Was it at all possible that Poppy could have been right? Poppy, whose skin had never been cherished, whose hair had never been styled and whose wardrobe was a joke, a bad joke. Surely Poppy couldn’t have discovered the secret of life? That would be too unfair for words” [p. 332]. To what extent does Poppy represent humanity’s most admirable qualities and values? In what ways does she fall short of your definition of the “ideal” person?

14. In “Pandora” and “Bruiser’s Business” Binchy uses the everyday interactions at a beauty parlor to shed light on the secrets, misunderstandings, and false assumptions that too often rule people’s behavior. How does Binchy both use and defy conventional stereotypes (about class, marriage, and sexual preference, for example) to make her characters believable?

15. Why are the stories of Melanie and Caroline coupled under the heading “The Intelligence Test”? What characteristics link the protagonists and their attempts to establish independent, meaningful lives? Were you satisfied with the way the conflicts were resolved?

16. Several of the stories in Whitethorn Woods deal with marriage and the way husbands and wives communicate with each other; others explore the relationships between parents and children as well as among siblings. What do the intricacies of family life tell us about human nature in general? In what ways does the novel deepen your understanding of what constitutes a good marriage and family?

17. The cast of characters includes simple country people, educated and sophisticated people, believers and skeptics. Which characters deal most successfully with the changes in their personal lives and the changes coming to Rossmore? In what ways do their stories redefine and add a new, modern meaning to the concept of faith?

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