HOME ECONOMICS

'Since I’ve had my first book published, I’ve earned more from cleaning than from writing. The home economics don’t add up.' 

Between 2015 and 2021 Caitríona Lally published her first two novels, Eggshells and Wunderland. To buy her time to write during those years, she returned to the housekeeping department at Trinity College Dublin, a job she enjoyed as a student. This began a negotiation between the practical and creative demands of her life, further complicated when she became pregnant and downright baffling when the pandemic hit.

At Trinity, Lally and her colleagues moved through empty, hallowed libraries, bonding over rude conference attendees. At home, she was raising two children who didn’t sleep. And the success of her first book was making her second novel seem even more arduous. Amidst all this, it was cleaning work that brought her satisfaction – immediate and lasting.

In her first memoir, Lally writes with honesty and humour about trying to solve the equation of mother + cleaner + writer. Forward and thought-provoking, self-deprecating and soaked in her singularly frank voice, Caitríona Lally puzzles over personal economics, creativity and what 'success' and 'failure' really mean in this writer’s life.