The Misremembered man is not the type of book I would normally read and almost stopped reading it several times but was so glad I didn’t. It is a wonderful story, well written and totally captivating, set in Northern Ireland in the 1970’s. 

Lonely bachelor Jamie McCloone’s kind hearted neighbours decide that it is time he found a wife so they place an advertisement in lonely hearts column of the local paper.  Lydia, a lonely spinster, rector’s daughter and school teacher answers it.  Both are looking for love but they are from totally opposite upbringings and the only thing they have in common is that both their characters have been shaped by their sad and repressed childhoods.  

Throughout the book there are so many authentic and colourful characters, full of warmth and humour, evoking memories of an age long gone. This book made me happy and sad in equal measures. Humour and heartbreak are used with great effect throughout. It is a sharply observed and sensitively handled book, with its poignant descriptions of the loneliness of its two main characters, especially Jamie, the solitary bachelor so common in every county and village in Ireland in the 1970’s.

There is everything here that makes for a good read – a great storyline, authentic characters, humour, suspense and tragedy. Despite the hesitant start I was not able to put it down until the last page was read – completely captivating and definitely worth its five star reviews.

This is Christine McKenna’s debut novel.