Claudine Cullimore

 

Life
b. Waterford; lived in France and Belgium in child-care (‘nanny’); settled in Winchester with her husband and daughter; author of Lola Comes Home (Penguin 2000), 465pp., a first novel; Small Town Girl (Penguin 2003), 448pp.

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Commentary
Kathy Cremin, interview, The Irish Times (24 March 2001), relates that Cullimore, returning from ten years nannying in Brussel, feels is acutely conscious of her stunted education where everyone is now professional. Remarks that Lola Comes Home is not a ‘chick novel’ though ‘all the ingredients are there’. Penguin is said to be ‘making much of her fresh, funny Irish voice for the 18-30 market’.

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Notes
Lola Come Home (Penguin 2001), 464pp.- After 10 years abroad, Lola returns to Ireland and her family, to sort out her life. She looks back on her childhood and considers her family: her French mother, her father (terrified of his wife), her lesbian sister, her youngest sister, Belle, and her brother, JP - about to get his comeuppance. (Google notice.)

Small Town Girl (Penguin 2003), 448pp. - A hilarious and compelling new novel [...] In a small town, everyone knows everything about you and what they don't know, they can easily find out. So when Rosie Flynn’s husband Richie leaves her for an older woman -a much older woman - the inhabitants of Waterford are only too eager to share every moment of Rosie’s shock and humiliation with her. Rosie thinks she’ll never get over Richie, that her life will never be the same. But with the help of her family and friends she discovers, to her surprise, that she wouldn’t want her old life back anyway .. (Amazon notice.)

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