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Starred review from March 27, 2023
Magee debuts with a consummate and searching bildungsroman of a young Belfast man trying to square his future with a painful heritage. It’s 2013, and Sean has just earned an English degree in Liverpool, his departure from Belfast alone a feat among his old mates, who came of age with no prospects in the wake of the 2008 recession. Now he’s back home, squatting in a dodgy flat, stealing groceries to survive, and trying to hold down a nightclub job while getting blasted on cocaine and vodka with his friends. The sectarian violence of the Troubles is in the rearview, but the memories are ever-present. His mother, whom he moves back in with after the squat is repossessed, used to hide guns in their house when he was a little boy; and his estranged father narrowly avoided execution by the IRA. In a poignant series of revelations, Magee shows why Sean’s father was targeted, why he was saved, and why Sean doesn’t see him anymore. Along the way, Sean serves out a community service sentence for assault, another event that Sean gradually unpacks in his thoughtful narration. He also makes new friends from nearby Queen’s University, who offer glimmers of a different life. Magee demonstrates profound psychological acuity and a keen sense of place, showing how Belfast has shaped his characters and how the past is etched into the streets. His strongest achievement is in the sensitive portrait of Sean, who doesn’t want to lie to himself and eventually works up to the truth. Readers won’t want this to end.