Our September Book Club selection takes us into a powerful story of friendship, courage and hard-won freedom. In this The Women on Platform Two book review, we explore Laura Anthony’s moving historical novel about two ordinary women whose brave choices helped change the future for generations of Irish women.

Dublin, 1969: Maura has just married Dr. Christy Davenport and they look forward to growing their family. But as her husband’s vicious temper emerges, Maura worries that her home might never be safe for a child. Meanwhile, her close friend Bernie, a mother of three, learns the devastating news that another pregnancy could prove fatal.

Dublin, 2023: A close call makes Saoirse realize that she may never want to be a mother. Little does she know that only a few decades ago, a group of women made this option possible for her. And she’s about to meet one of them… 

Dublin, 2023: Saoirse is relieved when the pregnancy test is negative. She just doesn’t feel like she’s ready to be a mother yet.  Her boyfriend is not as pleased. After an argument, Saoirse leaves the apartment and ends up chasing a lady onto a train to return on old photograph the lady had dropped.  When the train departs before she can get off, she sits with the lady, Maura, who tells her the story behind the photo and why she takes this trip to Belfast every year. 

The book is based loosely on the plight of Irish women in the 1970s to demand the right to contraception. All forms of contraception in the Republic of Ireland were banned, including the purchase of condoms.  While Northern Ireland and most of the rest of the world had access to birth control at that time, in strictly Catholic Ireland, all forms were illegal.  Women who were raped or pregnant outside of marriage were disowned by their families and forced to seek illegal abortions, or sent to a home for unwed mothers, which was similar to prison. Many died. 

Maura tells the story about the 2 ladies in the photo. Herself and her best friend, Bernie. Maura was working at a high-end department store when she met the man she would marry in 1969, Dr. Christopher Davenport, known as Christy. He was very successful, owned a beautiful home, and loved Maura. It seemed like the perfect match. However, after the marriage, Christy’s violent side emerges. 

Bernie, who becomes Maura’s best friend, is happily married to a butcher and lives over the shop.  They have 3 girls, but the doctors have told her that another pregnancy could prove fatal.  

Maura and Bernie meet near the butcher shop when Bernie accidentally runs the pram into Maura, causing her to drop the large bag of meat and cuts her ankle.Bernie offers to walk Maura home when she realizes that she is Dr Christy’s wife. As they talk, Bernie suspects that Maura is pregnant, but Maura has never been told anything about reproduction by her mother.  As their friendship grows, they exchange recipes, secrets, confidences, and fears. When Bernie decides to try to go to Belfast to buy condoms, Maura and Bernie confront the risks they are willing to take to have control over their own futures.  

WHY I LIKED THIS BOOK:

This book grabs your attention from the very first sentence.  I love the way the story unfolds. At first you think the story is about Saoirse, but she’s just the person who moves the plot along.  Once they are on the train, the story is told in a series of flashbacks as Maura tells about her life before meeting Dr Christy, how he swept her off her feet, and her shock at his violence toward her that began right after the wedding. Maura goes on to tell about meeting Bernie and her daughters, the rocky start to their friendship, and how it soon blossomed into a deep, trusting, unbreakable friendship. As they discover more about how they are being oppressed, they make decisions that change the future for women in Ireland. 

While the book is historical fiction, based on a true event in 1971 when women 47 women boarded a train from Dublin to Belfast to buy contraceptives, that could not be legally imported nor sold in Ireland, I feel the book is as much about friendship as anything else.  Maura and Bernie’s friendship grows slowly.  They have to learn to trust each other.  Their lives are such a contrast of each other….their relationships with their husbands, their financial and social status, the reasons they each are seeking contraceptives.  Yet they have so much in common. The irony is that they are both lonely for entirely different reasons and they need contraception for entirely different reasons

Because of their determination and perseverance, Saoirse has choices.    

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW

There are incidents of domestic abuse described during the story. There is loss and miscarriages. This is not a book of happy endings. The ending is realistic.  Even when we get the ending of Saoirse’s story, it feels genuine. This is based on a true event and real life does not always give us happy endings. 

I really enjoyed this book.  I loved how realistic the story was and how the characters were developed.  So much so that I was as shocked as Maura the first time Christy became violent.  You really felt like you knew Maura and Bernie and I loved how their friendship developed.  Bernie’s scrapbook almost had it’s own personality.  It became the history of their friendship.  If you can get past the few scenes of domestic violence, I highly recommend you read this book.. It will stick with you for a long time.  It is a reminder that we should be grateful to the women who went before us and the battles they fought for the liberties we have today.  

Recommended links:

The Women on Platform Two by Laura Anthony is our September selection for the Unconditionally Her Book Club.

Learn more about The Women on Platform Two by Laura Anthony on the publisher’s official website.

The novel was inspired by the historic 1971 Contraceptive Train, a landmark protest against Ireland’s restrictions on contraception.

Visit Unconditionally Her for more book reviews and recommended reading.