The Little Red Chairs - Edna O'Brien

This story sees a 90s Serbian war criminal turned new-age healer (an obvious Karadzic manqué) turning up in a rural Irish backwater. Once established as a massage oil doling sex therapist, he impregnates the wife of a failed draper before the long-arm of an Garda Siochana whisks him off to stand trial in the Hague. Retribution is then visited on Fidelma, the woman he leaves behind by the wagging tongues of her neighbours and the altogether more terrifying hands of her erstwhile lover's former bodyguard. Forced to flee to London, Fidelma is transformed into that Irish every woman who leaves home under a cloud of disapproval or common or garden poverty, who then works in any menial job she can find, becoming strong in the process. O'Brien weaves a tale of violence and male weakness and female empowerment that is compelling and yet strangely tender. Mna na Eirean  have probably never had a more telling or powerful advocate.