Josie is a widow living in a remote old house outside an Irish village, possessed by memories of her troubled marriage and one clandestine love affair. Her solitude is violated by the arrival of an escaped IRA terrorist, McGreevy, a bloody crusader for a United Ireland, who has chosen her beautiful home for sanctuary as he has plan for a new action. Their coexistence - a hostile standoff at first between the yearnings of an elderly woman whose youthful joy was broken an the intransigent idealism of her captor - evolves in to something far more ambiguous. Before the novel reaches its powerful conclusion, they have come to an understanding. House of Splendid Isolation marks a new departure and a new degree of acheivement in Edna O'Brien's distinguished career. The portrait she draws of the enduring dilemma of her native country is compassionate, wrenching, and unforgettable.