Maps can be read for many things - geography both natural and man-made - and Tomás made sure that the Great Hunger was inscribed on his drafts and in his name books, that it was recorded, in symbols and writing, that its effects and scars would be seen, its evidence and testimony unmissable, for all time.
Described as ambitious, Land, by Maggie O'Farrell, is promising to be one of the biggest books of 2026. The author of Hamnet delivers another stunning and vividly detailed story, immersing readers in the life of the Irish.
Beginning in 1865, the story opens in a time of transition. Tomás and his son Liam are mapping Ireland for the Great British Ordnance Survey. O'Farrell portrays maps as so much more than changes in topography: they mark the movements of the people and the stories behind them from the beginning of settlement in Éirann.
Tomás' story is goes back to the time of the Great Hunger or The Great Famine. His people starved or were taken by famine sickness. Those who survived were destined for the workhouse after being turned out of their homes by English landlords. Children in the workhouse were renamed, forgetting their origins while carrying the guilt of outliving their loved ones.
Land is by default a story of colonisation and invasion: by Saxons, Vikings, Normans, the 'capture of the Irish soul by the priesthood' and by the British, for whom Tomás condenses traditional Gaelic descriptive place names into the clipped sounds of English. All have forced their ways of living upon the indigenous people of Ireland.
O'Farrell's book observes the art of mapping as an a "...peculiar mix of science and storytelling, mathematics and artistry."
Like earth, the lives of generations of people are layered upon maps: preserving the history of localities, the stories behind place names, their owners and the villagers who dwelt there. Many of Land's characters share a perspective of their lives, (including the incarnations of the family dog, Bran), illustrating the irrevocable connection between the land and generations of families whose lives and deaths have become part of it.
Superstitious, ritualistic early Iron Age fort dwellers and 'meanderers' who melted into the landscape as their time gave way to invading settlers, tell stories of magic, sacrifice and oneness with the earth and its creatures.
(Liam) considers telling them about the time on the hillside, the day their lives were set off-course, or maybe even on-course, because who is not to say that the six of them were destined to end up exactly where they did?
Tomás is a symbol of rebellion and the old belief system: before the priests brought Catholicism, before the Great Famine.
After he drinks from the source of ancient wisdom at the tobar, or sacred well, hidden for all time in the copse on the side of the mountain, Tomás rebels against mapping the land for his British landlords. In his head has been planted something from the time of myth, songs and ancient language: "...a map of the thin places, the points of confluence between our world and other worlds."
He retains the idea of the land storing ancient energy like the ghosts of those who have lived and died there and the land having a soul or wairua, physically and spiritually linked to the people. The map the redcoats want denies this truth and is central to Tomás' lifelong internal conflict, as well as his loss of knowledge of where he came from.
Land is also a metaphor for the forks in the road of life, the search for home or the search for adventure that ironically reminds travellers of how much they have left behind, at a time when the tyranny of distance was absolute. It's a story of separation and reunion, with uplifting moments to balance out the negative experience of the Irish diaspora. I liked the idea of ocean as a road, taking settlers to North America, where home is described as within you and without, with culture kept alive in song.
O'Farrell fills this book with vivid descriptive language and imagery. From the flowers of the bog to the sound of the donkey, the thoughts of the dog and the idea of first Phina, then Rose being 'the pin' that holds Tomás' family together, all contain an underlying spirituality connected to beliefs as old as time.
Repeated motifs of colonisation and rebellion, tragedy and recovery, renaming, rebirth and the importance of telling stories emphasise an idea of the circular nature of time in these lives lived on the land: the sacred copse, Bran the dog, a gold claddagh ring and a race of meanderers that never really disappeared.
O'Farrell acknowledges at the end of the book that the story was sparked by the history of her great-great-grandfather, who worked for the same Ordnance Survey as Tomás, in the time after the Great Hunger.
It's hard to find anything to criticise in this book, although some have found its sprawling narrative challenging. If you view it as a saga the narrative form makes more sense. At times I couldn't see the page for tears. This book astounded me and warmed my heart, as seasons affect the land. I think this book is destined for greatness. It's been optioned by Hera Pictures, who produced Hamnet for the big screen.
...with a map, a person could never get lost. With a map, a person could always know where they were.
More:
- Read books by Maggie O'Farrell
- Irish Travellers - Wikipedia
- The Five Great Invasions of Ireland - by Bagtown Clans
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