A Letter from Mary Beth Keane

A few years ago, I had a surprise bestseller in my third book, a novel called Ask Again, Yes. That whirlwind publication confirmed for me what I’d always suspected; that in the wide and varied landscape of publishing, what matters most is the reader. Nothing has a bigger impact than one trusted reader saying to another: try this one. The messages I received at that time came from men, women, young, older, all across the country describing how profoundly they connected with the story. That experience was life-changing for me and renewed my faith in sharing fiction as an act of radical empathy; a key to understanding each other.

Now I have a new novel, Whale Harbor, and it’s my hope that readers love this one as much as they loved Ask Again, Yes. The story of Whale Harbor was inspired by my father’s life, and the seed was planted around the time of his death in 2022. He was so ill that he reverted to his first language (Irish, Connaught) and kept talking about a single decision he made in 1963 that he regretted. A small thing in my view, considering the life he ended up having. But not so to him.

 

Whale Harbor starts in Connemara, Ireland before it moves to Montana and then New York. On the surface, the story is about eleven brothers and what happens to them in the aftermath of a tragedy. But it’s really about love, family, and forgiveness – forgiveness of others but also of oneself. I hope you can find time to read it, and if you read it and love it, I hope you let people know.

 

Thank you for reading!

 

Mary Beth