BookBrowse Reviews This Human Season: Strong characters provide a sympathetic rendering of both sides of the Northern Ireland conflict. Novel

Set during the last two months of 1979 Louise Dean's novel is a show stopper, not least because the "troubles" in Northern Ireland are a very sensitive subject for any English author to write about without appearing biased, but she pulls this delicate feat off with aplomb. In this, her sophomore novel, following Becoming Strangers, Dean avoids taking sides or even getting into the politics of the situation in any detail, instead she focuses on the universal human tragedy that occurs when neighbors go to war with each other.

She also neatly avoids falling into the trap of simplifying the conflict on purely religious grounds; the story is told from three perspectives: Kathleen Moran, a Catholic mother of four children; John Dunn, a former British soldier, with no vested...