Academy Street by Mary Costello (2014): A Review

Title: Academy Street

Author: Mary Costello

Publication Year: 2014

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐💫

Pages: 179

Source: Book

Genre: Literary fiction, Historical fiction

Awards: Winner of the Irish Book Awards Novel of the Year Award; The Irish Book of the Year in 2014.

Opening Sentence: It is evening and the window is open a little.

Academy Street follows the life of Tess, an Irish woman, from her childhood in the 1940s through her immigration to the United States and eventual return to Ireland in the 2010s. The novel chronicles her journey through decades marked by loss, displacement, and quiet endurance. Told in a series of brief vignettes, the story traces Tess’s life with a restrained, unsentimental voice that avoids embellishment or melodrama.

As a reader, I found myself appreciating the understated tone and brevity of Costello’s writing. Tess’s passive approach to life, while at times frustrating, felt tragically authentic. The narrative’s simplicity allows for moments of genuine poignancy, such as her unrequited love, the heartbreak of having a child out of wedlock (no small scandal for a Catholic woman of her era), and her struggles as a single mother. Tess never quite manages to find a close, lasting romantic relationship ever, which adds a layer of loneliness and longing to her story. What’s particularly striking is how Tess, though living an outwardly ordinary life with little visible impact on the world around her, is still shaped—and sometimes undone—by the major historical events that play out in the background. These larger forces intrude most devastatingly in her later years, quietly underscoring how history can touch even those who seem detached from it. Still, there are glimmers of hope and connection: the tender friendship between Tess and Willa, and her late-in-life discovery of literature and fiction, which offers her a fleeting sense of possibility. The book’s greatest strength is its ability to evoke deep emotion with minimal flourish, quietly drawing the reader into Tess’s world and the universal experience of loss.

The book reminded me of Claire Keegan’s “Small Things like These”—both are brief, atmospheric, and resist over-dramatization, which I consider a virtue. That said, Academy Street’s minimalist style may not appeal to everyone. The lack of dramatic plot twists or sweeping character arcs can make it feel more like a briskly moving timeline than a fully immersive novel, and Tess’s passivity might leave some readers wanting more agency from the protagonist. Some may find Academy Street too uneventful, or wish for a deeper exploration of Tess’s inner life. At least Costello had the mercy not to stretch it to 1000 pages. You know whom I am talking about?