Julie McDermot has just been released from 'The Mental', the psychiatric institution where her husband committed her after the devastating loss of their two infant children. Returning to her narrow, lonely life along the canal, Julie is haunted by grief and the aching absence of what might have been.

As she struggles to piece herself back together, an unexpected encounter with a stranger along the canal offers a glimmer of connection and the fragile possibility of hope. Their encounter also brings long-submerged realities to the surface, to a place where they can no longer be ignored; exploring Ireland's dark history of institutional incarceration and offering a profound glimpse of hopein a stunning portrait of a woman's life.   

Moving and deeply evocative, this novel is a powerful meditation on sorrow, isolation, and the surprising ways joy can return to even the most broken heart.



John McKenna is the author of seventeen books—novels, short-stories, memoir, biography and poetry. He has also written a number of stage and radio plays and is a frequent contributor to RTE Radio 1. He is a winner of the Hennessy New Writing Award, the Irish Times Fiction Award and the Cecil Day Lewis Literary Award; his novel The Space Between Us was shortlisted for the Kerry Book of the Year Award. He was recently nominated for the position of Irish Fiction Laureate.



The Lock-Keeper's Wife is a delicate, dense portrait of one woman's restless, beautiful mind, her passionate commune with nature, and the neglects she endures and, wonderfully, rises above. The writing is perfect and extraordinary – the work of a prose maestro.



The Lock-Keepers Wife is one of the most evocative and beautifully written books I have read in a long time. Daring in its simplicity this is a small but perfect book, not a word or sentence is out of place. The minute I finished reading it, I immediately turned to begin reading it again, which only happens with rare books but such is the power of John MacKenna's writing and visual imagery in this moving novel.



An absolute treasure of a book … This is exquisite storytelling … A delicate and fraught story, in a similar vein to Sebastian Barry's 'The Secret Scripture', and it's not to be missed



Lyrical … Written with light … For fans of Claire Keegan's 'Foster'.



Small and perfectly formed … MacKenna has wrought another masterpiece.



It's a gorgeous and very serious piece of writing … A yarn of yearning.