1. Girls in Their Married Bliss by Edna O’Brien (1964)
The third of The Country Girls trilogy which began with The Country Girls (1960) followed in 1962 by The Lonely Girl (republished as Girls With Green Eyes). The first was banned by the censor, i.e. the Catholic Church—God bless ’em, for they helped catapult O’Brien into the forefront of Irish literature. The trilogy follows Kate and Baba, two lasses from the Shannon bogs, from convent school to the bright lights of London. They finally get what they set after, only to find that they cannot go home again.
2. Birchwood by John Banville (1973)