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Reviewed by Mansoor Ahmed for Readers' Favorite
If I Had You by Paul G. O'Connor is a quietly romantic novel that begins with a confession: a man who always wanted to fall in love, and the one summer that almost gave him everything. Nick Sullivan is a young man from Boston who travels to County Clare, Ireland, to spend the summer with his grandmother, Nana. What Nick does not expect is Molly, a dark-haired Irish girl with pale blue eyes, and a mother who would sooner attend his funeral than approve of him. Their romance unfolds against the Cliffs of Moher, small-town pub life, and the particular tenderness of two people who know a summer has an end. Back in Boston, a loan shark, a shared debt, and the memory of Molly take the novel forward across years and continents.
Paul G. O'Connor writes with a gentle warmth that suits the Irish setting perfectly. The dialogue is one of the book's greatest pleasures: Nick and Molly's banter at the cliff edge feels completely natural, and Nana's dry declarations land like small gifts throughout. The pace is unhurried and conversational, much like the soft Irish days the novel evokes so well. I found myself particularly fond of Nana, whose philosophy of doing what you love led her quite logically to betting on the horses every weekend, and whose presence gives the book much of its humor and heart. The themes of chance, memory, and the particular ache of love interrupted by circumstances give the story an emotional undercurrent that stays with you. If I Had You is a warm, well-crafted novel that reads like a long letter from someone who genuinely believes love is worth the gamble.
