Winner of the Shirley Jackson Award, a modern gothic horror where a young woman falls into a dark obsession after a new artist and her baby arrive on her small Irish island.
Sexual assault, graphic body horror, suicidal thoughts, chronic illness/caretaking, abuse/neglect.
At night, my mother creaks. The house creaks along with her. Sometimes in the morning we find her in places. We never see her move. We just come upon her.
Aoileann is cursed. She has no friends, never gone to school. She has never left this windswept craggy isle off the coast of Ireland. Her mother is cursed: a silent wreck Aoileann calls the “bed-thing.” Alongside her grandmother, Aoileann’s days are an endless monotony of feeding, changing, and caring for the bed-thing.
Their island seems cursed, whispering secrets only Aoileann hears. Then Rachel, a vivacious artist from the mainland, arrives with her colicky newborn. Rachel arouses yearnings Aoileann cannot fully comprehend. Soon, the unfolding of her mother’s secret tragedy and Aoileann’s pursuit of her own dark desires are both destined to unleash a maelstrom upon all three of their lives.
Described by New York Times-bestselling author John Connolly as “perhaps the finest Irish horror novel of the 21st century,” Where I End is a modern Irish gothic that will pull readers into its undertow of family resentments and relentless obsession.
Don't just take our word for it...
“This is a truly different Irish novel. One that entwines Irish myth, the reality of human bodies, life and death, and traditional gothic horror in a macabrely beautiful and, in the end, redemptive dance.”
– Irish Independent
“Where I End by Sophie White is a beautifully voiced, horrific novel about a teenager and her grandmother who live in isolation on an Irish island caring for the girl’s bedridden mother. The layers of the story unfold like an onion, one rotten at the core. Harrowing, glorious body horror (in an unexpected way), and one of the best novels of the year.”
– Ellen Datlow, editor of The Best Horror of the Year
“If men did pregnancy, more horror would look like this: everyday caring with the volume turned up slightly and slowly until it is a scream that chills you to your insides, and echoes long into the night.”
– Books Ireland Magazine
Taste the very first page
My mother.
At night, my mother creaks. The house creaks along with her. Through our thin shared wall, I can hear the makings of my mother gurgle through her body, just like the water in the walls of the house. I hate the sound. In the daytime, it is covered, wrapped up in the radio and the wind and the low hum of the electricity. But at night, in the silence, her insides gush and she seems alive in a way that, during daylight, she does not. The gush forces thoughts of her effluent, her needs; of the things my grandmother takes care of but that I will have to do someday soon. I don’t want to, which makes me feel bad. I hate her body—it’s an awful thing.
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