Niall Williams

"Change is coming to Faha, a small Irish parish that hasn't changed in a thousand years. For one thing, the rain is stopping. Nobody remembers when it started; rain on the western seaboard is a condition of living. But now - just as Father Coffey proclaims the coming of the electricity - the rain clouds are lifting. Seventeen-year-old Noel Crowe is idling in the unexpected sunshine when Christy makes his first entrance into Faha, bringing secrets...

Christine and Niall have settled into their new lives in Ireland and are ready to start a family. But they are bitterly disappointed when they learn they cannot have children. What follows is a year of waiting to adopt a baby, a year in which they continue their pastoral lives - farming, tending livestock and sharing a commumity spirit with neighbours.

An award-winning author documents a year living in the garden of his wife's ancestral home in Kiltumper in rural Ireland, following the natural rhythms of the earth as they observe its wonders.