Time of the Child

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.