Jean Grainger

The West's Awake Lib/E Jean Grainger

Queenstown, Co Cork. Ireland. 1916

Sixteen-year-old Harp Devereaux is growing up in a country in turmoil. Her mother Rose is struggling to navigate single parenthood, run the Cliff House, and stay out of the way of the authorities. Harp's uncle, Ralph Devereaux, has only one thing on his mind. The port of Queenstown bustles with activity as people traverse the Atlantic either in search of new lives on foreign shores or returning to old familiar ones in Ireland. The Cliff House is fast gaining a reputation as a wonderful place to stay, and the business is going from strength to strength. Rose and Harp have turned their fortunes around and for the first time they are prosperous and independent. But all is not well. Civil and military unrest across the country in the wake of the Easter Rising is threatening to bubble over, and everyone is on edge. The British soldiers are making their presence felt in unpleasant ways, and the return of Ralph Devereaux to what he sees as his ancestral home is poses a serious threat. Just as they are managing the situation, a series of unforeseen events places both Harp and her mother in grave peril. Ralph suddenly holds all the power and is not afraid to wield it. They desperately need help, and there's only one place they can go to get it.

From a tense Queenstown to the vibrant Irish community in Boston, from wartime Liverpool, to the streets of Dublin seething with revolution, The West's Awake continues the spellbinding Queenstown Story.