Maggie's Door by Patricia Reilly Giff

Giff, Patricia Reilly. 2003. Maggie's Door. New York: Random House.

Childhood friends Nory Ryan and Sean Red Mallon have known each other for as long as they can remember. Unfortunately, just as they are beginning to feel something more than simple friendship for each other, a terrible blight strikes the potato crop, the main source of food and income for most Irish people, bringing poverty, starvation, and death to Ireland. Set in the mid-19th century where war, prejudice, and religious differences with the English have left the Irish people without any rights; including the rights to their own lands, Nory and Sean Red's families have no alternative but to leave Ireland. They set out for America and Nory's sister Maggie who left home the year before and is now living in Brooklyn, New York. The vision of Maggie's front door, and Maggie waiting to welcome them into a new life, sustains them during the long, dangerous, ocean voyage from Galway to New York. Through alternating chapters told from first Nory's point of view and then Sean Red's, the author adds authenticity by evoking images of the horrors that millions of desperate Irish people experienced due to the famine; the horrible, sickening stench of potatoes putrifying in the fields, bodies left to rot because those still alive hadn't the strength to bury them, and the fear of separation from both family and homeland. And yet, despite the horrors and desperation of this moment in history, Maggie's Door remains a story of hope, the resilience of the Irish people, and the power of kindness in dark times that will resonate forever.