The Summer Guest

Sunlit Doorways of the Heart

When Isobel Byrne arrives at her late aunt’s weathered cottage by the rugged Galway coastline, she expects dusty mementos and faded photographs. Instead, she discovers a hand-written invitation tucked inside an antique music box: “For the one who dares to dream again.” Haunted by grief over a marriage lost and a career left behind, Isobel finds herself drawn to the sea-sprayed dunes and the ancient clifftop paths where childhood laughter once echoed. Each morning, she follows hidden footpaths, uncovering fragments of her aunt’s secret life—a journal streaked with ink and salt, a forgotten love letter in Gaelic, and a single yellow rose preserved in an old book. As she pieces together the puzzle, Isobel senses that the summer guest more than merely visited these shores: she transformed them.

Echoes Beneath the Wishing Stone

Guided by Conor Flaherty, the village’s taciturn stonemason whose green eyes mirror the restless Atlantic, Isobel embarks on a quest to restore the cottage’s crumbling garden. Between dawn-lit seed-planting and twilight conversations beside a crackling hearth, the pair breathe new life into rusted gates and tangled hedgerows. Conor reveals the legend of the “Wishing Stone,” a time-worn boulder said to grant solace to those who lay their burdens upon it. As storm clouds gather and secrets surface, Isobel confronts the memories she buried long ago—and, in turn, offers Conor the chance to reclaim dreams he believed lost to the sea.

A Tapestry Woven by the Tide

As summer ripples toward its golden peak, Isobel unearths the final message her aunt left behind: a confession of sacrifice, a vow of hope, and an invitation to forge a new beginning. In a breath-catching finale beneath the cliffside’s wild fuchsia blooms, Isobel stands at the threshold of love and legacy. She must choose whether to return to her former life in Dublin or remain by Conor’s side, where each sunrise brings the promise of renewal. Emma Hannigan weaves a luminous tale of second chances, where the sea’s unending rhythm teaches that healing often arrives on the salt breeze—and that every heart can find a way home.

Author’s Epilogue

. Emma Hannigan was an Irish novelist and memoirist celebrated for her warm, heartfelt stories of resilience, family bonds, and the quiet strength found in everyday acts of courage. Her novels have touched readers around the world with their generosity of spirit and vivid sense of place.