“I am such a fan of Niall Williams.” —Ann Patchett, New York Times bestselling author of TOM LAKE
“A study in human community that made me laugh out loud and remember how to love even the people who cause others so much suffering, and especially those who come together to ease it.” —Margaret Renkl, The New York Times
“In this poignant novel, miracles abound . . . An engrossing read, the dark and the rain and the shabby but hopeful holiday decorations blending with the peat smoke and the love, all coming fully alive on the page. And that is something of a miracle itself.” —Laurie Hertzel, Boston Globe
“Dazzles . . . A stylistic cousin to the vernacular achievements of Kevin Barry and Roddy Doyle, but also distinctive: Williams draws on idiosyncrasies of speech but with an eye on literary gloss . . . Williams packs his paragraphs with lush imagery and piercing psychological insight. Line by line, it may be the most beautifully written novel I've read this year. Let's raise a glass of mulled wine to an Emerald Isle master at the peak of his powers.” —Hamilton Cain, The Washington Post
“Revelatory . . . Perhaps the most heartwarming thing of all is how the reader is welcomed into Faha's world. When I cried, it was because, with his careful and compassionate depictions of people, place and time, Williams reminds us of the humanity in all, of the vitality of a community that comes together, and of the power in revealing our vulnerabilities to others.” —Jen Doll, The New York Times Book Review
“Another master class in stunningly poetic depictions of the sorrow and beauty of arduous lives.” —People
“A lyrical writer . . . Moist eyes are all but assured.” —Heller McAlpin, The Christian Science Monitor
“Gorgeous, wry and humane . . . Time of the Child may have the best sentences of any novel this year . . . An essentially realistic book that lovingly observes the minutiae of its characters' day-to-day lives but there's an element of quiet magic afoot, too.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune
“Moving . . . Follows a widower and his 29-year-old daughter as they go through the motions of daily life while concealing core truths about themselves-until a foundling child upends their comfortable routine.” —The New York Times Book Review, "7 New Books We Recommend This Week"
“I've just emerged from a Niall Williams binge with a belated appreciation for his writing . . . [Time of the Child] feels, at once, realistic in its rough and comic everyday unfolding and mythic in its riffs on the grand themes of despair and spiritual redemption . . . [it] gives readers that singular experience of nearness to the marvelous.” —Maureen Corrigan, NPR.org
“On the surface, Time of the Child by Niall Williams is an elegiac portrait of life in an Irish village in the Christmas season of 1962. But it is so much more than that. Somehow, by laying bare the inner lives of these decent country people, my own life feels so much richer for having read it. I was deeply moved by this novel.” —Mary Beth Keane, New York Times Bestselling Author of ASK AGAIN, YES and THE HALF MOON
“A powerful pleasure to find myself back in Faha where the prose is luminous, the people irresistible, the stories mesmerizing, and it never stops raining.” —Karen Joy Fowler, New York Times bestselling author of We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves and Booth
“Oh, the utter goosebumpy pleasure of reading this book! The experience will fill you up, even if you didn't know there was an emptiness there to begin with. Niall Williams reminds us again and again that the small and the ordinary are married to amazement, that dailiness and miracles walk hand in hand, and that other people are a mystery: Approach with curiosity! Approach with grace.” —Catherine Newman, New York Times bestselling author of WE ALL WANT IMPOSSIBLE THINGS and SANDWICH
“With writing so stunning, Time of The Child forces the reader to turn down page after page to always remember what genius is. Another glorious and touching novel from Niall Williams, one of the world's greatest storytellers.” —Anne Griffin, internationally bestselling author of WHEN ALL IS SAID
“There is so much to admire in Niall Williams new novel-the lyrical language, how landscape and destiny intertwine, the complex bonds of community-but what impresses most is how vividly he enters the innermost thoughts of his characters, thus revealing their seemingly quiet existences brim with the profoundest questionings of how we should live our lives. Time of the Child is a triumph.” —Ron Rash, author of SERENA and THE CARETAKER
“Niall Williams is one of Ireland's greatest storytellers, and Time of the Child is his finest, and most compelling work to date.” —Simon Van Booy, author of SIPSWORTH
“This is a story to read slowly, to savor, and to return to again and again. I suspect that when I pick it back up in years to come, rediscovering Williams' characters will feel like a reunion with old friends.” —Washington Independent Review of Books
“Resplendent . . . Few contemporary novelists create worlds and characters so amazingly alive and specific . . . Anyone who cherishes great writing should want more and more from Williams.” —Bookpage, starred review
“Exploring possibility with a generous and intimate spirit, Williams invokes an ode to love.” —Booklist, Starred Review
“A beautiful writer.” —Hozier
“A Christmas miracle lies at the heart of this tender offering . . . Williams works up to the miraculous event with steady pacing, breathing life into the characters and crafting a memorable sense of place. For those looking to get into the holiday spirit, this is just the ticket.” —Publishers Weekly
“Williams . . . is a master of Irish storytelling, crafting sentences that tempt the reader to double back and read again - and characters that get under your skin.” —The Associated Press
“The remote, rain-soaked village of Faha is to the brilliant Irish writer Niall Williams what Yoknapatawpha County was to William Faulkner . . . Time of the Child is a Christmas tale of the very best sort, one that reminds us of the fundamental mystery of being human. Even in this sinking parish on the furthermost edge of nowhere, in the dark and dying time of the year, there's something in the air that speaks of the miraculous.” —California Review of Books
“One of my favorite books of the year . . . It's a rich, complicated, believable story. And while you may hope for a happy ending-or at least the possibility of a happy ending-it's too real to just assume a happy ending. But hope? Hope in human nature and hope in decency and hope for change in a stunted life? You can always have hope, which Time of the Child offers in abundance.” —Parade, “26 Best New Book Releases This Month: November 2024”
“A superb choice for anyone who wants to satisfy an avid reader on a gift list this year. But the truth is that it's a timeless story to be relished in any season.” —Bookreporter
“An exquisite portrayal of everyday life in the rural west Ireland of 1962 . . . Akin to Dickens in his observations, Williams' descriptions of gesture hint at his characters' interior landscapes. Kind and funny, this needs a great film director.” —Woman & Home
“Williams's phrasing is immaculate and even the smallest characters are drawn with attention and detail . . . Dr Troy is the heart of this slow, rich novel.” —The Times
“A slow-burning, finely crafted novel about second chances, humanity and familial love, Time of the Child rewards close reading . . . Williams's descriptive language is extraordinary – his use of understatement and irony artfully deployed, his characterization sublime.” —The Observer
“Williams quietly lets us glimpse the story's underlying harshness between the lines of his warm and finely turned festive tale . . . It's another lyrical, mid-20th-century tapestry set in a slowly transforming society as the advent of electricity revolutionizes everyday life.” —Daily Mail
“If you're looking for a holiday season weepie, Niall Williams has you covered.” —AV Club, 10 Books You Should Read in November
“It's rare in contemporary fiction to see a community so well imagined and brought vividly to life. With a blend of thoughtful characterization and language that both captures the tenor of Irish speech and is beautiful in its own right, Niall Williams' Time of the Child might be just the gift we all need for the holidays.” —Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“Heartwarming . . . If you are looking for a novel that speaks to our better angels, put down the newspaper, turn off the cable news, and read Time of the Child.” —Air Mail
★ 10/01/2024
Readers are welcomed back to Faha, the Irish village that featured so charmingly in Williams's previous novel, This Is Happiness. In this new work, it is now 1962, and Faha has entered the modern age, with the arrival of electricity and telephones. Another arrival, just before Christmas, is an abandoned baby, discovered by young Jude Quinlan at the back gate of the church. With the help of two bachelor brothers, Jude takes the baby to the home of the village doctor. Dr. Troy lives with his daughter Ronnie, who helps him nurse the frozen baby back to health. As a result, the baby quickly becomes attached to Ronnie. Over the next few days, the doctor hatches a scheme that would allow his unmarried daughter to keep and raise the baby (unlikely to be otherwise permitted in ultra-Catholic Ireland). Conspiring with the doctor to keep the baby a secret before the authorities come calling are Jude and the two brothers. Doady and Ganga, making a return appearance from This Is Happiness, also play an unwitting part in this plan. VERDICT With its elegant plot, endearing characters and subtle humor, this is a lovely Christmas miracle of a book.—Barbara Love
★ 2024-08-03
In a small Irish town, the local doctor deals with the very young, the very old, and the possibility that he’s ruined his daughter’s life.
“To those who lived there, Faha was perhaps the last place on earth to expect a miracle. It had neither the history nor the geography for it. The history was remarkable for the one fact upon which all commentators agreed:nothing happened here.” Well, they are wrong about that. This sequel to Williams’ much-lovedThis Is Happiness (2019) is set in the same town several years later: Christmas season 1962, a period when small-town machinations of all kinds come to a head. These are presented in Williams’ signature prose style: sinuous sentences that may seem at first a bit hard to follow but in short order reveal themselves to be full of music, humor, and insight. Like the work of writers from James Joyce to Anna Burns, Williams’ novel is one of those books that teach you how to read it, ultimately staking out its own linguistic territory in your brain. As for the idea that “nothing happens here”—nothing except that 12-year-old Jude Quinlan finds an abandoned and possibly dead baby in a courtyard; the assistant priest is scheming furiously to replace his geriatric superior, who keeps wandering off, both physically and mentally; and Dr. Jack Troy, healer, brains, and backbone of Faha, fears he has made a terrible mistake. His oldest daughter, 29-year-old Ronnie, who after her mother’s death and the departure of two younger sisters still keeps house for her father and helps him run his practice, was courted by a young man named Noel Crowe. Troy shut down the relationship, thinking the boy unsuitable, but now gleans that Ronnie has been inquiring about Crowe, apparently crushed to learn he’s emigrated to the U.S. Overcome with remorse, the good doctor cooks up a daring if cockamamie plan. One need not have read the first installment to enjoy the second; reading them in the opposite order is just as good.
Treat yourself to this.