This is the first time I've read Maeve Binchy, though I've heard of her for a long time. At 642 pages, this book is one of the longest I've ever read (probably second longest to Gone with the Wind).

The thing that is remarkable is that there are no wasted parts of this book. It's dense. Everything serves the story. Everything keeps moving. There are no forays into intensive detail, no historical background that goes unused. The characters are believable, even when they make surprising moves. I thoroughly enjoyed the writing. I felt connected to the characters and was genuinely proud of their personal growth, genuinely interested in what would happen to them.

It amazed me how many characters there were, yet the way they were introduced, I never got them mixed up or confused.