Becoming Finola

Proving her prolificacy beyond the shadow of a doubt, local author Suzanne Strempek Shea has just released her second book of the season. "Becoming Finola," a 322-page novel of love, passion and personal growth, is Strempek Shea's seventh book, and the first that is set in a locale other than her hometown of Palmer, where she still lives. Strempek Shea has only recently released another book. "Shelf Life," which hit the bookstore shelves in April, is an autobiographical account of her first year working a part-time job at Edward's Books in downtown Springfield. She will formally unveil "Becoming Finola" Wednesday night at 7 at the Broadside Bookshop, 247 Main St., Northampton. The public is welcome to meet the author and listen to her read from the book as well as discuss her work. In "Finola," the 45-year-old former newspaper reporter casts her literary net 3,000 miles away to the tiny, made-up town of Booley in western coastal Ireland. There the main character, Sophie White, moves quickly from being a tourist in the town to an employee in a tiny shop, filling in for the mysterious Finola O'Flynn, whose life she overtakes in a quest to find herself. Besides working the job of the woman who left suddenly to make a new life with a new man, Sophie lives in Finola's house, wears her clothes, and even falls in love with Liam Keegan, Finola's ex-lover and the owner of the gift shop, aptly named Finola O'Flynn. The story line heats up when Finola returns to Booley, finding Sophie in her house, wearing her clothes and enmeshed in the life of the man she seemingly wants back. Without giving away the ending, suffice it to say that Sophie emerges as a strong character, strong enough to be called "a plucky, lucky American minx who becomes the sort of Irish lass that would have made Maureen O'Hara proud" in a Booklist review. Strempek Shea said the beginnings of Finola happened during a trip she made in Ireland in 2001, following her treatment for breast cancer. On that trip - she herself was on a journey of personal change and growth - she found herself in a tiny gift shop on the west coast of Ireland, straightening out displays in much the same way as Sophie does in an early scene. "The guy in the shop said to me, "Do you want to work here?" Someone had just left and he needed someone to make signs and help out," she said. "I left without the job, but in my head I had the little kernel of a story," she said. Two years later, Strempek Shea brought the story to life to meet a contract deadline with Washington Square Press, the publisher of her four other works of fiction. Her two non-fiction works are published by Beacon Press. Strempek Shea took nine months to write this book, turning out her usual three to five pages per day even as she was writing "Shelf Life." A lively storyteller who peppers all of her books with her natural grace and humor, Strempek Shea will likely never run out of ideas. She is now working on a novel "Large, Hairy Male," about a woman who touches the lives of others as she picks up a dog she has purchased on the Internet. "Becoming Finola" was released as a paperback, and costs $13.