Saints for all Occasions

Written by J. Courtney Sullivan

Narrated by Caroline Lennon

'This year's best book about family' Ron Charles, The Washington Post

A sweeping, unforgettable novel from The New York Times best-selling author of Maine, about the hope, sacrifice, and love between two sisters and the secret that drives them apart.

Nora and Theresa Flynn are twenty-one and seventeen when they leave their small village in Ireland and journey to America. Nora is the responsible sister; she's shy and serious and engaged to a man she isn't sure that she loves. Theresa is gregarious; she is thrilled by their new life in Boston and besotted with the fashionable dresses and dance halls on Dudley Street. But when Theresa ends up pregnant, Nora is forced to come up with a plan - a decision with repercussions they are both far too young to understand.

Fifty years later, Nora is the matriarch of a big Catholic family with four grown children: John, a successful, if opportunistic, political consultant; Bridget, privately preparing to have a baby with her girlfriend; Brian, at loose ends after a failed baseball career; and Patrick, Nora's favorite, the beautiful boy who gives her no end of heartache. Estranged from her sister and cut off from the world, Theresa is a cloistered nun, living in an abbey in rural Vermont. Until, after decades of silence, a sudden death forces Nora and Theresa to confront the choices they made so long ago.

A graceful, supremely moving novel, Saints for All Occasions explores the fascinating, funny, and sometimes achingly sad ways a secret at the heart of one family both breaks them and binds them together.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Little, Brown (Hachette UK) Audio
• Release date: Aug 31, 2017
• ISBN: 9781405538510

Reviews for Saints for all Occasions

[sriddell_8 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A book both sad and hopeful. The story follows two sisters who migrate from Ireland to Boston in the mid-20th century, and how the choices they make echo into future generations.

Once in Boston, the two sisters take dramatically different paths - one goes through with a pre-arranged marriage, and the other while more free-spirited takes some unexpected twists and turns.

[write5review · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Family Feud

If you grew up in a family of size, and particularly one with roots in the old country, you appreciate how seemingly small slights can set off a feud lasting years. And family gatherings, oh boy, sometimes they could get, well, explosive. Better to look in on somebody else’s family feud, like Courtney Sullivan’s Irish clan of Rafferty-Flynn.

It boils down to an incident, a very big incident, between the two Flynn sisters, Nora and Theresa. Their family ships them off to America in the late 50s, to Boston and the Irish enclave there. Nora is the older; Theresa the younger. Nora is solid, formal, old Irish to her marrow. Theresa is younger, a teen, impetuous by the standards of the day and the isle they hail from. The idea upon emigrating was for Nora to marry Charlie Rafferty, who preceded her. It almost doesn’t happen, until Theresa gets herself into “trouble,” code of the day for pregnant outside marriage. Then Nora, the responsible one to her own mind, has to hatch a plan. The plan involves taking Theresa’s burden entirely onto herself. Thus, her life in American begins with a lie and a secret that goes on and on, affecting her own family in subtle ways (though among the young, nobody knows Nora has a sister, and that Patrick is not of her issue).

Theresa flees, apparently because she is the irresponsible one. But not really, because the pain of watching Nora raises her baby named Patrick (as well as has and brings up three of her own) is just too painful. She knocks about for a while in New York, and eventually finds solace in her Catholic religion, specifically as a cloistered nun. Thus, she and Nora disappear from each other’s life. Until years later, in 2009, when Patrick dies in single car accident, drunk at the wheel, the opening of the novel.

The story alternates from present to past, back and forth, as well as from character to character, these being the Rafferty children as middle-aged adults, John, Bridget, and Brian. Really, though, it’s Nora’s tale and how she relates to her sister over the years. True, they have little contact, but, as Sullivan clearly portrays, you carry people around with you, in your head and your heart, what you loved about them, your points of resentment and anger, your turmoil over either reconciling or not. And further, how even the closest of people, as Nora and Theresa were in their youth, can never really know what the other thinks or feels, and certainly not when you erect barriers, as Nora does.

Overall, you’ll find this an often engrossing tale of family life of the type that is all but vanishing from the American scene but for immigrant groups, like the Rafferty-Flynns. If you’re from a family of any size, you’ll probably see bits of yourself and your siblings on these pages. There’s much here that will resonate with people, like Charlie and Nora’s frugality for one. “Sixteen dollars for a margarita! I can’t get over it,” shouts Charlie, days after their son John takes them to a fancy beach restaurant. Oh, boy, hear you brother.

[carriewuj · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

3.5 in the audio book edition, the Irish brogues were charming. This story flips back and forth between 1950 and 2009. In 1950, Nora Flynn and her younger sister Theresa immigrate to the US from Ireland. Nora's finace Charlie Rafferty is already there in Boston living with relatives and starting to build a future for them. Though this seems more promising than Ireland, Nora has some reservations about Charlie and their marriage of convenience. Meanwhile, Theresa, only 17 sees nothing but possibility for her future and begins studying to be a teacher and becomes a social butterfly at the weekly parish dances. She meets a man and in her naivete gets pregnant. This changes Nora's trajectory too as she settles down into family life with Charlie. The 2009 storyline centers on the death of Nora's oldest son, Patrick 50-some years later. The 3 siblings are gathered in the Boston home where they grew up and try to make sense of Patrick's sudden death. Some great observations about family life and the ties that bind (and blind) and changes across an era, especially for women. "The moment a woman was born determined so much of who she was allowed to be." "Motherhood was a physical act as much as an emotional one. It took every part of you." "When she was young and thought of marriage in the abstract, she believed it was about two individuals, each living a mostly independent existence. Now she saw that marriage was like being in a three-legged race with the same person for the rest of your life. Your hope, your happiness, your luck, your moods, all yoked to his." Evocative of Anne Tyler. The ending is a bit abrupt and there are a few loose ends, but it was an escape to be part of the Rafferty family for a little while.

[dawnlovesbooks · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When Nora’s mother dies, she is left to be responsible for her sister Theresa. Nora lived in her sister’s shadow for most of her life. Theresa was brave, beautiful and clever and she was everyone’s favorite. Theresa wanted to be a nun until she discovered boys. When she does discover boys she ends up pregnant and felt like God leading her to be a nun. She often “wondered if her devotion could sustain her for the rest of her life or she was only seeking an escape.” She couldn’t decide is she was in hiding or she had finally found her home. The walls used to keep the nuns in imprisoned her with her thoughts and regrets. Although she found some peace she “never stopped feeling the sadness” of the child she left behind. She was plagued with what ifs and missed her sister and her son terribly. Her pain was part of who she was. “A mother blamed herself until the end.”Nora stepped in and took Theresa’s son Patrick to raise as her own. Nora felt like she had sacrificed her life and suffered the most for Theresa’s sins and she was very resentful about it. Nora’s marriage is one of practicality and duty, not of romance and love. If it wasn’t for Theresa’s baby that she had to raise, she may have never married Charlie. “Happiness was not a state to which Nora had ever aspired.” Nora had been a shy person with no confidence and no voice until she had children. “Nora’s children had made her tough. On their behalf, she was able to do whatever needed doing.” Nora was not one to show emotion or discuss pain and it made her seem stern and strict. The book begins with the death of Patrick. His siblings, (Bridget, John and Brian) are a part of the story as well. “The four Rafferty children had their roles. Patrick, the wild one, their mother’s favorite. John, the over-achiever, their father’s favorite. Bridget, the girl. Brain, the baby.” John has always felt like “nothing he could do was ever good enough for Nora. His entire life had been shaped by the quest for her approval.” “For most of his life John had hated Patrick. He was 45 years old and there were events from childhood that he was still not over and probably would never be.” John and Patrick were always at war with each other. John felt like he was never the son that Nora wanted most. Bridget also feels neglected by Nora, deep down all she wants is her mother’s approval. Nora was forever criticizing Bridget and trying to improve her. Bridget is a lesbian and can’t bring herself to tell her mother, although the rest of the family knows. Brian is the youngest of the siblings and he was the closest to Patrick. They ran a bar together. Brian used to have a baseball career and since it ended has felt like a failure. Patrick could do no wrong in Brain’s eyes. “Brian had built his life around Patrick-what would he do now, who would he become?”Everyone in the family has guilt over Patrick’s death. When a nun shows up at the funeral, the family wonders what they don’t know. “How could you be this close, be a family and yet be so unknown to one another?”“Death made the important things you had to do in a day feel inconsequential. It turned out almost everything could wait.’“Without warning grief might poke you in the ribs, punch you in the gut, knock the wind out of you.”This novel was a great story of a dysfunctional family and the death the brings them together. I highly recommend this author.

[sbojo32 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This was another book I really wanted to like. I was drawn to the premise and I enjoyed reading about the rich history of Nora, Theresa and the children. However, this book went on for far too long and without ruining anything, didn't address many of the huge items that went through the entire book. I get there were vague references and left open for interpretation, but if I'm going to read through 300+ pages of these issues, I want them to be resolved within the story.

[rmarcin-630843 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I read this book as a book club selection. I found the story interesting as it went from the 1950s to the 2000s. Nora and Theresa, two sisters, make the journey across the Atlantic from Ireland to America. Reading about their thoughts and lives as new immigrants was a good snapshot into life at that time. Based on the decisions they make after arriving changes the paths of their lives. It is a book of family, caring, mistakes, pride, fear, and love.

#SaintsforallOccasions #JCourtneySullivan

[auntmarge64 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An immersive story of three generations of an Irish-American family, centered on the fate of two sisters who immigrate to Boston in the late 1950s. Nora, the eldest, hasn't seen her fiancé in a year and is apprehensive about a future with a man she barely remembers. She dreams of having a different future than marriage to him. Younger sister Theresa is pretty, young, and willful. It's not giving much away (and is revealed in chapter 1) that Theresa gets pregnant and Nora, convinced she has a duty, marries her fiancé and raises the child. Theresa finds her own niche at a cloistered convent, and the two fall out. The first chapter ends with Nora calling the convent to tell Theresa that her 50-year old son, Patrick, has died. The rest of the book goes back and forth in clearly-dated chapters to fill in the stories of their lives and those of Nora's now-grown family. But hanging over it all is the specter of Theresa's arrival at the funeral, an event Nora hadn't expected from a cloistered nun, and the response from her family as she must now explain that she has a sister of whom they're unaware. So cleverly is the story woven that the reader wants to follow all the individual lives and the family drama and, especially, the hope for a reconciliation. Beautifully done.

[lyndainoregon · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Two sisters emigrate from Ireland to America in the mid-1950s, one to marry a man she doesn't love, and one to fall in love with a man she cannot marry, setting off a tale of duty and deception that spans half a century.

This is not a book for readers who want a beginning, middle, and end. It jumps backward and forward in time with multiple stops in between. Sullivan uses this structure to allow the reader to see her characters operating with incomplete information, yet understand (as the characters themselves cannot) how the hidden and revealed truths of their lives influence their decisions and the events that unfold from those decisions.

Neither of the sisters is particularly likeable. Nora, the elder, is duty-driven but takes little pleasure in it. She begins the book as a shy, inarticulate 21-year-old, driven into responsibilities far beyond her years by her mother's early death. Theresa, at 17, has a verve and curiosity that will lead her unwittingly into a situation that changes their lives irrevocably. By the end of the novel, they have essentially changed places: Nora has found a strength -- even a hardness -- that allows her to stand her ground and be seen by her family as an unbending pillar, while Theresa has become content and whole in a life that from the outside, seems incredibly restrictive. Theresa's change in particular is the most difficult for the reader to accept while at the same time being absolutely essential to the unfolding of the story.

Ireland, the Catholic Church, and the transplanted culture of the Irish emigrants, are almost characters in themselves. Don't look for shamrocks and leprechauns, or bloody tales of The Troubles, though. At one point, one of the characters muses on how much "more Irish" the American-born seem to be than their parents were. But the family ties and interrelated support among an emigrant community and the heavy hand of a patriarchal church are woven throughout the tale.

It's an engaging read, but the conclusion is somewhat of a letdown. After the long and twisting path to get to that ultimate scene, Sullivan just chops it off abruptly. It's like a 300 page game of Chutes and Ladders that suddenly ends when someone zips down the chute to the finish line and that's it -- we're done.

[rdra1962 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Great opening chapters, then it slows down a bit as the story is revealed- a bit too slowly. Easy read, great for the summer!

[mhanover10 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Interesting story and really shows what it was like in the 60's when you talk about an unwed pregnancy and how it can affect a family. This didn't end the way I was hoping it would and I was a little let down. But overall it was a good story.

[dknight0918 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

It took me a while to finish this one because I wanted it to last and kept putting it down on purpose. I really enjoy Sullivan’s work. I look forward to reading more of her books. Her prose is stunning. I loved reading about the dynamic of the Rafferty family. It was also interesting to learn more about nuns and abbeys.

[rglossne · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Nora and Theresa Flynn immigrate to America from Ireland and find their way to Boston, specifically Dorchester. Nora, the serious and responsible sister, marries a suitable man and has four children. Theresa, the more rebellious sister, becomes a nun in a cloistered convent. A powerful family story shows how their decisions and history resonate through three generations.

[othemts · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The Irish-American family novel has a lot of familiar tropes - resentments, feuding, alcoholism, unexpected pregnancy, Catholicism, generation gaps, poverty to prosperity, et al.  Sullivan (no known relation to yours truly) employs them all, but her great gift in writing is characterization.  The novel is set over a few days in 2009 after the death of the eldest child in the Rafferty family, the 50-year-old bar owner Patrick, in a drunk driving crash.  The family comes together for the wake and funeral with the unexpected arrival of an elderly nun unknown to the children of the family.  In-between descriptions of the few days leading up to the funeral the novel flashes back to fill in the family history, starting with the sisters Nora and Theresa leaving their Irish village to emigrate to Boston, and how Nora takes the conventional course of marrying and raising four children, first in Dorchester, and later in Hull, Massachusetts, while Theresa becomes a cloistered nun. It also explains the falling out to the two sisters and why the children grew up unaware of Theresa's existence.  Nora and Theresa alternate as point of view characters with wonderful insight into their complex characters.  The reader also gets to learn of the each of the surviving children, John the overachiever who found unexpected success as a political adviser to Republicans in deep blue Massachusetts (including a thinly-veiled Mitt Romney character), Bridget who is never quite sure that Nora has accepted her as lesbian but wishes to inform her mother of her and partner's plan to have a baby, and Brian, the youngest who has moved back in with his mother and seems directionless after his baseball career flamed out in the minor leagues.  It's a touching and heartbreaking novel, and not quite all that you'd expect.  Favorite Passages:"She had long known that in this family, the truth got revealed belatedly, accidentally, drunkenly, or not at all. But still, she felt hurt."

[shazjhb · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Some parts of the book were great. Think it left way too many unanswered questions. It seems as if the author became bored with the story.

[brangwinn · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

If you enjoyed Colm Toibin’s Brooklyn, this book with its multilayered story about two Irish sisters who emigrated to Boston Massachusetts in the 1950’s will be equally appealing. Like Toibin, Sullivan can create memorable characters who shape and are shaped by their experiences. When one sister gives birth out of wedlock to a baby boy, the other sister and her husband adopt the baby. This action shapes the entire story, showing how, even in close knit families like the immigrant Irish, secrets which are meant to shelter others from pain can impact all in the family.

[thewanderingjew_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Saints for All Occasions, J. Courtney Sullivan, author, Susan Denaker, narratorWhen the story begins, a phone rings in the middle of the night and a lone sleeping woman, Nora Rafferty, is told that there has been an accident.Then the story moves to the mid 1950’s. Nora Flynn and her sister Theresa Flynn are preparing to travel to America. Nora is several years older than Theresa and is going to be married to the man she has been betrothed to for years, Charlie Rafferty, when they arrive in Boston. Although she has had second thoughts, she believes she has no other real alternative. They were supposed to be married in Ireland in County Claire, uniting their properties and managing their farms. It felt more like a business arrangement to her than a marriage based on passionate love, but it suited them both. When Charlie’s dad decided to give the farm to his older son, Charlie was sent to New York to stay with relatives. He was to make his fortune there. When he had enough money saved, he sent for Nora who would not leave Ireland without her sister. Nora was very reserved, Theresa was the opposite, fun loving and outgoing. While Nora remained in the cabin for most of the voyage, Theresa made friends and had a wonderful time.Both women got jobs and lived in a boarding house, sharing a room. Nora puts off her wedding, without any real explanation, until Theresa finds herself in a compromising situation. For Theresa, America is a playground. She is naïve and having so much fun, until she gets mixed up with a man and becomes pregnant. She is sent to a convent until the baby’s birth. Nora suddenly decides to marry Charlie immediately and begins to pretend she is pregnant. She has decided she will raise Theresa’s baby so that her sister will not have to give him up entirely. The baby will not be given up for adoption. His name will be Patrick, the name chosen by Theresa. This is what was done back in that day when a young unmarried female found herself pregnant. It was hidden and considered shameful. That decision to sacrifice her life is what drives the story forward. We watch and learn how this decision affects Theresa, Patrick, Nora and her future family as they go forward into the future.Theresa’s child, Patrick, is a difficult young boy. Nora, exhausted, grows resentful. Soon, angry words are exchanged and Theresa decides to run away, promising to one day return. She asks Nora to love Patrick until that time. She reunites with a friend she met on the boat over and soon becomes a teacher, fulfilling Nora’s dream for her. Later, she becomes a cloistered nun.Nora loses contact with her for years, and she grows angrier. She has somewhat of a bitter nature. Eventually, when there is contact, she refuses to allow her sister to have anything to do with her son or with the rest of her family after a brief conversation. She never even tells her other children that she has a sister. Patrick does not know that Theresa is his mother. It is not hard to keep up this façade as decades pass, because Theresa, now known as Mother Cecilia, does not leave the convent. Secrets proliferate; lies become what is interpreted as the truth.The growing pains of the Rafferty family are dissected. The bumps in their relationships are explored. I viewed Nora as a woman with two sides, either cruel or kind. She was strict and very bound to old ways and the rules she had always lived by. While Theresa finds peace, Nora holds onto grudges and wallows in her resentment. Family dynamics are splayed to be viewed and judged by the reader.My own feelings for Nora were somewhat schizophrenic, vacillating from respect to disgust. Although she often did what she thought was best, she was often close minded, cruel and resentful. It sometimes outweighed the moments when she opened up her heart. She was always protecting herself and her family from what others might think. She was very controlled. Her character and behavior was typical of the Irish immigrant of that time period, and the narrator portrayed her perfectly as far as personality and accent, placing her in the time period appropriately. The author described her well and made the atmosphere of the times and the environment in Boston real. She brought Nora’s and Theresa’s feelings, their dreams and disappointments, to the table, placing them in the mindset of that 50’s decade.It was interesting, however, to watch each of the women grow, one becoming more socially active after being a shy young woman and one who was never shy becoming retiring and choosing to live in a silent world; one who loved fashion who retreated inside a habit and one who never gave fashion a second thought breaking out of that mold and even running social events.Because it takes place from the mid 1950’s to around the end of the first decade of the 21st century, social mores, women’s rights, alcoholism, scandals of the church and improper behavior of the priests and nuns, abortion and birth control were sprinkled and explored throughout the narrative. The discussion of religion was approached very openly and honestly as was the discussion of alternate choices of love interests.The narrator represented each of the characters well, capturing individual personalities and accents so that each was recognized as a part of a particular background. I enjoyed listening to her Irish brogue which was charming and authentic sounding to my ear. She made the story come alive on every page so that I witnessed the hardship, the sadness, the joy and the fears of Nora and her sister Theresa.I had some difficulty following the thread when the story moved back and forth in time trying to explain certain events more fully, and at those times, there was some repetition, as well. The politics of the day was inserted through the use of the church and its stand on women, abortion, sex and marriage, but was handled without prejudice. I enjoyed the dialogue between the characters. It felt as if they were real as they struggled to communicate with each other and live in the more modern world. The reader witnesses their response to both failure and success.The author analyzed relationships, family interactions, and changing mores and technology over the decades. She showed how choices alter our lives, often behind the scenes without our knowledge; some can make peace and some can never find it, instead choosing to make everyday a war zone.In the end, I thought it was interesting that Theresa had a child out of wedlock, completely unplanned; unmarried, and is shamed by everyone who knows. Yet, in the end, Brigitte, Nora’s daughter, involved in a lesbian relationship, is not married and is carefully planning her own pregnancy using a sperm donor, without shame. Our values have traveled in a full circle. I wondered, also, how much did Theresa or Nora really adjust and change to accommodate the changing world? Did both just march in place?

[smallwonder56_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Interesting story about members of an Irish family who immigrated to the US. Their stories are interesting, the writing is wonderful and it keeps you turning pages.

[beamis12 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

4.5. I has been quite a while since I have read a family generational novel, a family drama if you will, though in this the drama is kept to a minimum, at least in the telling. Two sisters, Nora 21 and Theresa arrive from Ireland, they have traveled alone so that Nora can marry her boyfriend who had arrived previously. Let's just say that things do not work out as planned and the two sisters will take different paths, but always connected by a secret.I loved the way this story was told, so natural and unassuming. The way the author uses the framing of a death to tell her story of lives lived. Fell in love with these characters, their past, their personalities, flawed and so very real, felt as if they could he family members we get to know them so well. Parts take place in a contemplative Abbey and I enjoyed learning of the lives of the sisters who lived within. Secrets, the complicated roles of family members, feelings, thoughts, the families we make and the families we are born to are all themes. How an unexpected happening can affect our personalities and the roles we assume in the future. The changes that result and that we must find a life despite our choices. I loved so much about this book, a book whose situations called for drama and yet the author manages to hold back, not let the story descend into a soap opera. Was quite sad to let these characters go, but so glad to have read their story.

[froxgirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Two sisters leave Ireland in the 1950's for a better life in Boston. Maybe because I live here, this novel seems to be a retelling of what's been frequently told before about Irish-American locals - stern mother, sweet father (or vice versa), someone or someones with major alcohol issues, and another son or daughter who is either gay, a junkie, or marries out of the race. So nothing new is revealed in this story of a son with two mothers who are also sisters, and their "dreadful secret". Descriptions of Dorchester, where "everyone wants to be from and no one wants to live" and of scenic Hull by the sea, are enjoyable for locals. And the inner lives of the family Rafferty are sometimes touching and well rendered, but well-worn.Quote: "Their new neighbors, whose families had been in America for two or three generations, talked about being Irish more than anyone she had ever met. As actual Irish people, Nora and Charlie were like celebrities to them."

[girlwellread · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A special thank you to Edelweiss and Knopf Publishing Group for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.Two sisters, 21-year-old Nora and 17-year-old Theresa Flynn, leave their small village in Ireland and embark on a journey that will bring them to America. Nora is the more responsible of the two; she is practical and shy and accepts the proposal of a man she isn't entirely sure she is in love with. Theresa is a free sprit that is easily charmed with her new life in Boston which includes dresses and dance halls. When Theresa ends up pregnant, it is Nora that comes up with a plan that ultimately changes the course of their lives.Fifty years pass—Nora has four grown children: John, a successful political consultant; Bridget, in a relationship and preparing for a baby; Brian, a former baseball player who has moved back in with Nora; and Patrick, Nora's favourite child, who is responsible for causing much heartache to those around him. Estranged from Nora, Theresa lives in Vermont in a secluded abbey and is a practicing nun. After decades of not speaking, a death in the family forces the sisters to confront the choices they have made and each other. This is a beautiful, sweeping novel about relationships, family, secrets, and sacrifice.