Spinner Publications announces upcoming release of first novel, “Blue Collars”

Blue Collars is a coming of age story about growing up during the late 1950s and 1960s in a New Bedford, Massachusetts working-class family. Catherine’s novel details the triumphs and tragedies of the Kilroy family through the eyes of young Finn Kilroy, whose father worked as a loomfixer at the Berkshire Hathaway textile mill along the city’s waterfront.

Surrounded by the love of a caring, extended family, Finn’s life seems, on the surface, to be carefree and idyllic. But a terrible secret haunts her childhood. This is the story of a young girl’s endurance in the face of betrayal and her brave efforts to overcome the shocks that rock her world.

About Book & Author: spinnerpub.com/Blue_Collars.html

Buzz for Blue Collars – here are some advance reviews:

“Catherine McLaughlin’s novel, Blue Collars, is a powerful work of fiction. From the first page to the last, the story is both real and relatable. Finn Kilroy and her supporting cast of characters jump right off the page, making Blue Collars a page-turner that kept me up late into the night. Highly recommended!” —Steven Manchester, #1 bestselling author, The Rockin’ Chair and Twelve Months

“McLaughlin’s work never fails to leave the reader enthralled. Blue Collars is no exception. In this book, we journey the streets, backyards, and factories of New Bedford in the late 1950s throughout the fevered sixties as seen by McLaughlin’s young heroine, Finn. We watch hopefully as Finn overcomes one issue, dilemma after another — problems too heavy for her slender shoulders to bear, and we, the rapt reader, look for solutions alongside her.” — Patricia Gomes, Poet Laureate, City of New Bedford, Massachusetts

“In Blue Collars, Catherine McLaughlin captures the full array of emotion from innocent joy and love to despair. On one page the main character Finn is playing blissfully at the beach with her father and siblings, on another she recalls the death of her best friend’s brother.

But mostly this is a story about a secret that gnaws at Finn throughout her childhood and adolescence – one that she believes would tear apart her tight-knit family. Like the dike protecting the harbor and factories of that New England city, Finn builds a wall of silence to protect her family. But the specter of guilt and shame leaves its imprint on the young girl.” — Elizabeth Pimentel, freelance journalist