New Ross
Port town on the River Barrow in south-west County Wexford, on the Kilkenny border, Ireland.
At a glance
| Source | Author | Role | In one line |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small Things Like These | Claire Keegan | setting | Bill Furlong’s coal-yard town in Christmas 1985, with the convent laundry on the hill across the Barrow. |
Sub-places
None yet.
Small Things Like These — Claire Keegan (2021)
Source: Small Things Like These · Readwise highlight
In the town of New Ross, chimneys threw out smoke which fell away and drifted off in hairy, drawn-out strings before dispersing along the quays, and soon the River Barrow, dark as stout, swelled up with rain.
- Role: setting
- In the book: The whole novella happens in New Ross in the weeks before Christmas. Furlong collects his coal off the quays, the town is shedding jobs (the shipyard has closed, Albatros has cut staff, Graves & Co. has shut), and a Christmas tree and manger stand in the Square. The Good Shepherd convent, with its training school and laundry, sits “on the hill at the far side of the river.” In the last pages Furlong leads Sarah out of the convent, down the hill, across the bridge over the Barrow and through the Square, past people he has dealt with all his life, toward his own front door.
- Why it matters: The small town is the point: everyone knows everyone, the nuns’ laundry is good business, and Mrs Kehoe warns Furlong that the nuns “have a finger in every pie.” His act costs so much because he must walk Sarah through the middle of it. In a city the rescue would be anonymous; here it is a public break with the town.
- Real vs. fictional: New Ross and the Barrow are real. The convent laundry is drawn from Ireland’s Magdalen laundries (the book is dedicated to the women and children who suffered in them); its exact real-world site is not pinned here. ⚠️ Not verified.