The Good People: Hannah Kent

From Hannah Kent, the bestselling author of Burial Rites, comes The Good People, set in nineteenth-century Ireland and based on newspaper reports and a court case from the time.

`Exceptional . . . Even better than Burial Rites’ Sunday Times In rural Ireland, 1825, three women gather to save a child. It all begins with rumours: stories of unexplained misfortunes. Nóra, mourning the deaths of her husband and daughter, knows the whispers are about her grandson. Four-year-old Micheál can no longer speak or walk, and people are saying that he is a changeling, bringing bad luck to the valley. In desperation Nóra begs the help of two others, Mary and Nance. Together, the women will do anything to cure the little boy, but as their world of folklore and ritual tightens around them, it threatens to blur the line between mercy and murder . . . `An imaginative tour de force . . . exquisite’ Daily Mail `Beautifully written’ Grazia `Hauntingly poetic and evocative’ Daily Express `Immersive, startlingly lyrical . . . thrillingly alive’ Metro `Evocative . . . compelling’ Guardian

Shortlisted for the Walter Scott Prize.

Based on true events, The Good People is Hannah Kent's engrossing novel about superstition and devoted love.

'An even better novel than Burial Rites — a starkly realised tale of love, grief and misconceived beliefs – Sunday Times

Ireland, 1825.

Nóra, bereft after the sudden death of her husband, finds herself alone and caring for her young grandson Micheál, who cannot speak or walk. What happened to the healthy, happy grandson she met when her daughter was still alive?

Mary arrives in the valley to help Nóra just as the whispers are spreading: stories of unexplained misfortunes, of illnesses, and rumours that Micheál is a changeling child who is bringing bad luck to the valley.

Nance has lived in the valley all of her life. She is a healer who knows how to use the plants and berries of the woodland; she understands the magic in the old ways. And she might be able to help Micheál . . .

As these three women are drawn together in the hope of restoring Micheál, their world of folklore and belief, of ritual and stories, tightens around them. It will lead them down a dangerous path, and force them to question everything they have ever known.

'An imaginative tour de force . . . exquisite' – Daily Mail