If you don't behave, Puckeen will come out of his box.Driving home late one evening, Etain Larkin finds a corpse on a country road and takes it to a remote farmhouse. She never speaks of that night again. Two decades later, Betty Fitzpatrick starts college in Dublin, and falls in love with the beautiful but troubled Ashling - who seems determined not to let Betty meet her family, especially her alcoholic mother, Etain.Ashling connects all the horrors inflicted on her family to a beloved children's TV show, about a puppet who lived in a box and would come out if you didn't behave. A puppet who no-one remembers ever seeing... except for Ashling.
Neil Sharpson is an Irish Novel Fair-winning author, podcaster, playwright and blogger based in Dublin. His novels include When the Sparrow Falls (Best Books of 2021, The Times), Knock Knock, Open Wide and The Burial Tide (Best Books of 2025, New York Public Library).
If you don't behave, Puckeen will come out of his box.Driving home late one evening, Etain Larkin finds a corpse on a country road and takes it to a remote farmhouse. She never speaks of that night again. Two decades later, Betty Fitzpatrick starts college in Dublin, and falls in love with the beautiful but troubled Ashling - who seems determined not to let Betty meet her family, especially her alcoholic mother, Etain.Ashling connects all the horrors inflicted on her family to a beloved children's TV show, about a puppet who lived in a box and would come out if you didn't behave. A puppet who no-one remembers ever seeing... except for Ashling.
Neil Sharpson is an Irish Novel Fair-winning author, podcaster, playwright and blogger based in Dublin. His novels include When the Sparrow Falls (Best Books of 2021, The Times), Knock Knock, Open Wide and The Burial Tide (Best Books of 2025, New York Public Library).