by Claire McGettrick, Katherine O’Donnell, Maeve O’Rourke, James M Smith and Mari Steed. Published by I B Tauris, 2021. (NZD 56.37). Reviewed by Cecily McNeill

I admire the writers of this harrowing account of the way young pregnant girls were treated by orders of nuns in Ireland for most of the 20th century. This exhaustively researched book should come with a warning — beautifully written but not an easy read because its subject matter is up there with the Catholic Church’s greatest scandals pertaining to child abuse, aided and abetted by the State. In fact the book highlights the many ways in which Church and State work together to hide the injustice in their practices towards the marginalised.

Nearly 50 pages of notes to the 200 pages of text show the documentation of the workings of religious sisters in the laundries even to the unmarked graves exhumed in search of an identity.

The five authors have interviewed many of the survivors and their families — their goal, to convince the Irish government of the State’s responsibility for the abuse that occurred in the laundries over decades. No apology has been forthcoming.

Critics of New Zealand’s own scandal, Gloriavale, will find an echo here as well as the families of the many punished by the Church for falling pregnant before marriage and those interested in constitutional law. 

Tui Motu Magazine. Issue 275 October 2022: 27