The Homecoming Seasons: An Irish Catholic Returns to a Changing Long Island

The Homecoming Seasons: An Irish Catholic Returns to a Changing Long Island is a memoir by James MacGuire that explores his return to his childhood community on Long Island after spending many years abroad. The book combines memories of his childhood with sketches of his family and friends, and a diary-like depiction of his return. It captures the wonder of the natural world, the life, death, and rebirth of the community, the joys and sorrows of marriage and parenthood, and the profound exultation of safely shepherding two sons to adulthood.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 284 pages
Publication date: 25 March 2022
Publisher: University Press of America

The Homecoming Seasons: An Irish Catholic Returns to a Changing Long Island is a profoundly moving memoir that delves into the re-experience of a returning native as he revisits his childhood community. After spending several years abroad as a graduate student at Cambridge, a Peace Corps Volunteer in Thailand, and a country program director of health care and agricultural programs in central Africa, James MacGuire returned to New York and spent most of the 1980s at Time Inc., Macmillan, and the Manhattan Institute. In 1990, he married and, a few years later, with a second child on the way, he and his wife decided to relocate from Manhattan to a small enclave called the Isle of Wight in the village of Lawrence on the south shore of Long Island, where MacGuire had grown up.

This book chronicles MacGuire's return to this world, exploring its evolution from ancient times, its occupation by indigenous peoples, its colonization by the Dutch and English, and its transformation into an early summer resort, an outer suburb, and finally, an inner suburb of New York City. Jamie MacGuire skillfully weaves memories of his childhood in this almost hidden world with sketches of his family and their friends, before updating his account with a lovingly detailed, diary-like depiction of returning. As he, his wife, and their children navigate this changed world, they make new friends and cherish the wonder of the wetlands and surrounding natural world, the poignant life, death, and rebirth of the community, the joys and sorrows of marriage and parenthood, and the profound exultation of safely shepherding two beloved sons to triumphant adulthood.

This is an uplifting literary memoir that earns and deserves the widest readership.

Weight: 449g
Dimension: 230 x 154 x 19 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780761873303