Reminiscent of both Colm Toibin's Brooklyn and Matthew Thomas' We Are Not Ourselves, this enveloping novel follows a fraught Irish family through unimaginable trials. It introduces its two main characters as young sisters ready to emigrate from Ireland to America and follows them through the rest of their lives. All of Sullivan's characters leap off the page. You don't read this book; you breathe it * Independent * In the spirit of Colm Toibin's novels comes Saints for All Occasions . . . A bittersweet story, but a brilliant one * The Lady * A fabulous read * Hello! * Beautifully drawn, with wonderful period detail. A compelling family saga, full of grief and regret, it's always absorbing * Sunday Mirror * Skilfully written, involving read * Woman & Home * This graceful and compelling family saga is beautifully drawn and full of grief, regret and wonderful period detail. At times Saints for all Occasions is achingly sad but it is always completely absorbing * The People * Depression over the state of the world kept me from reading for a few weeks towards the end of last year, but I started again with Saints for All Occasions, devoured it over a weekend and found my reading mojo again -- Jane Green * New York Times * A fascinating, riveting read -- Sarra Manning * Red * I hope to read another novel as strong and wise and beautiful and heartbreaking as J. Courtney Sullivan's Saints for All Occasions this year, but I'm not sure I will -- Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls With tenderness and a knack for depicting Irish grandmothers that anybody who has one will appreciate, Sullivan celebrates ordinary people doing their best to live saintly lives * Time * Fabulous and smart -- Emma Straub * New York Times * A breathtaking literary ode to life, change, and the unbreakable bonds of family * Redbook * An engrossing family drama . . . Sullivan's profound understanding of her characters and the Irish-Catholic culture that defines them illuminates every scene * People magazine * A blockbuster . . . An engrossing family drama with feisty humor and transformative tough love * Elle magazine * Moving . . . Eloquently testifies to the durability of the fabric of family . . . Touched with . . . warmth, kindness and gentle wisdom * Wall Street Journal * Carefully plotted . . . Sullivan succeeds in creating a believably complicated, clannish Irish-American family . . . Engrossing * New York Times * This year's best book about family . . . Elegant . . . Captivating . . . Deft and insightful . . . A quiet masterpiece . . . impressive. Saints for All Occasions is so unassuming that its artistry looks practically invisible. In a simple style that never commits a flutter of extravagance, Sullivan draws us into the lives of the Raffertys, and in the rare miracle of fiction makes us care about them like they were our own family -- Ron Charles * Washington Post *

J. COURTNEY SULLIVAN is the New York Times best-selling author of the novels The Engagements, Maine, and Commencement. Maine was named a 2011 Time magazine Best Book of the Year and a Washington Post Notable Book. The Engagements was one of People Magazine's Top Ten Books of 2013 and an Irish Times Best Book of the Year, and has been translated into seventeen languages. She has contributed to The New York Times Book Review, the Chicago Tribune, New York magazine, Elle, Glamour, Allure, Real Simple, and O: The Oprah Magazine, among many other publications. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.