Blood and Water

<p><strong>Susan arrives on Dune Island with a plan, settle her late uncle’s estate, sign the papers, and leave within a week. The inheritance is simple, a weathered cottage, a small distillery, a stubborn dog named Walter. </strong> <strong>On paper, nothing she couldn't sort in a week.</strong></p><p>Except Susan isn’t just there to close a chapter. She’s running, from Jen, from a loss she cannot yet name, and from a life that has quietly unravelled.</p><p><strong>But Dune Island has been keeping its own secrets.</strong></p><p>Cut off on the edge of the Wild Atlantic Way, where the ferry runs on Mick’s time and every glance carries a question, Susan begins to uncover what her uncle Frank left behind, not just property, but a lifetime of silence. And the longer she stays, the more the island reveals, buried stories, unspoken grief, a family history shaped as much by what was hidden as by what was known.</p><p>And as the past begins to surface, Susan must confront the truths she came to escape.</p><p><strong>She came to Dune Island to be alone. The island had other ideas.</strong></p><p><em>Blood and Water</em> is a haunting, beautifully observed novel about identity, inheritance, and the quiet devastations that echo through generations. With warmth, wit, and emotional precision, Rebecca Murphy introduces a striking new voice in fiction, one that lingers long after the final page.</p><p><em>Winner of the RTÉ Today Show Novel Competition</em></p>