Publisher: Penguin Random House Canada, June 2, 2026

Format: ebook

Pages: 384

Rating: 5/5 stars

Summary (From Goodreads):

‘You will never understand how the land remembers, how deep the roots grow’

A spellbinding story of separation, longing, recovery and survival as a family makes a new home in the aftermath of tragedy.

On a windswept peninsula stretching out into the Atlantic, Tomás and his reluctant son, Liam, are working for the great Ordnance Survey project to map the whole of Ireland. The year is 1865, and in a country not long since ravaged and emptied by the Great Hunger, the task is not an easy one. Tomás, however, is determined that his maps will be a record of the disaster.

The British soldiers in charge are due to arrive any day, expecting the work to be completed, but Tomás is sent off course by an unsettling encounter in a copse. His life, and those of his family, will never be the same again. Liam is terrified by the sudden change in his taciturn father. What was it that caused such cracks to open in Tomás and how is Liam, aged only ten, going to finish the mapping, and get them both home?

Land is a story of buried treasure, overlapping lives, ancient woodland, persistent ghosts, a particularly loyal dog, and how, when it comes to both land and history, nothing ever goes away.

My Review:

Thank you Penguin Random House Canada for the copy of this book.
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Read if you like: character driven family stories
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The book follows Liam and his family as they struggle to survive in post famine Ireland. Liam’s father, Tomas, is working for the British to draw a map of Ireland, and on one expedition, their lives will change forever.
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This was such a beautiful and heartbreaking story of love and loss as a family tries to survive in a difficult time in Irish history. I loved the description of the landscapes and how we got to follow all perspectives in the family. The connection between land and history was well done and the writing was amazing.