Lost and found

Evenings and Weekends by Oisín McKenna’s is an intimate portrait of contemporary adulthood. McKenna’s debut piece follows three interconnected protagonists navigating the messy reality of being a thirty-something in London, specifically during a sweltering June heatwave in 2019.

The novel centers on Maggie, a 30-year-old artist-turned-waitress who discovers she’s pregnant and contemplates leaving London’s unaffordable lifestyle for her hometown. Her boyfriend Ed, the father-to-be, sees this as a chance to escape his own troubled past. Their story intersects with Phil, Maggie’s best friend caught in an unrequited love affair while supporting his mother Rosaleen through a cancer diagnosis.

Meanwhile, a whale is stuck in the Thames. This bizarre occurrence serves as a powerful metaphor for the characters’ unspoken emotions and sense of claustrophobia being trapped in their circumstances. McKenna skillfully uses London in all its complexities as a backdrop to the experiences of adults struggling to build their futures in a city that is full of as many obstacles as there are lucky chances.

Poetic and lyrical: Drawing from his background in spoken-word poetry, McKenna creates vivid, immersive prose that vividly portrays the intensity of each character’s experiences, connecting the reader to their emotional journeys. While his lyrical style occasionally blurs individual character distinctions, it delivered a rich, authentic portrayal of modern urban uncertainty and longing, and a generation caught between ambition and reality.

WHERE TO GET IT- You can find the book on Amazon.