The Discovery of Finnegan Wilde
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Part adventure, part mystery, and part Celtic myth.
Dublin, 1913. Fifteen-year-old Finnegan Wilde steals to survive. Always on the run from gangs and police, Finn is also fleeing her own mysterious past, glimpsed only through nightmares and an unusual Celtic mark on her arm. When, in a chance encounter outside the museum, she scores a journal filled with strange diagrams, maps, and a drawing identical to her mark, Finn hungers for more than the next meal. She wants answers, and more than anything, she wants to find her family. Eddie Moore, a young apprentice archaeologist, has spent months trying to decipher an ancient manuscript he and his father excavated from a bog. The Moores believe it was written by Tomas, a 9th century monk, and that it holds the clue to finding the legendary Cauldron of Plenty, one of four Treasures of Ireland. But when Eddie’s father is seriously injured by a gang in an attempted robbery, Eddie alone must find the Cauldron. When their search brings them together, Finn and Eddie realize the mark on her arm and his ancient manuscript are connected. Finn doesn’t trust this awkward scholar from the rich side of town. Eddie is just as suspicious of this wild girl with no home, no past, and no rules. But if they can work together, perhaps—as Tomas hoped—they will make the greatest discovery of all. Three voices—those of Finnegan, Eddie, and Tomas—intertwine like a Celtic knot that readers will delight in unravelling to the very last page. Thistledown Press, (August 2025) ages 12+ |
2026 Red Maple Award Nominee
2026 IODE Violet Downey Book Award Shortlist
2026 Saskatchewan Book Award Finalist
2026 CCBC Experts' Pick
"A grand adventure through Irish legends,
full of ancient magic, secrets, and hidden treasures."
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- Kevin Sands, author of the bestselling The Blackthorn Key and Thieves of Shadow series.
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"I fell in love instantly with the smart, sassy, lonely Finn-
and soon after, Eddie and every other character in this story
so richly steeped in Irish lore....
As for the mysteries that pulled me along,
and what Finn eventually discovers…
all I can say is Wow!
Anyone aged ten to one hundred
who passes up the chance
to read this book is missing a bet!"
- Kathy Stinson, internationally acclaimed author of the classic Red is Best and award-winner The Man with the Violin.
"This fast-paced, well-researched book transported me
and I thoroughly enjoyed all things Irish while I was away"
It’s daunting to receive a 406-page novel for review. If poorly-written, it’s a tremendous slog to read. On the flip side, if the story’s seeped in richly-described settings, features distinct and memorable characters, and showcases deft plotting (including a major twist), the pages quickly slip by. Fortunately, The Discovery of Finnegan Wilde—a historical novel for young adults by Governor-General Award-winning writer Caroline Pignat—fell firmly into the latter camp.
My first surprise was that the title character is a girl. Fifteen-year-old Finn lives rough on the streets of 1913 Dublin. She “was in the business of surviving,” which included pickpocketing, and “lying was Finn’s mother tongue.” The scrawny lass has no memory of family, is targeted by another young urchin, Dooley, and—when she can escape the Woodhall Workhouse orphanage where she’s kept in a medicated fog—she sleeps beneath “a rusted sheet of metal,” cold, hungry, and among rats.
This lively book’s two other important characters are Eddie, a lonely apprentice archaeologist (under his archaeologist father) at the National Museum, and the 9th century monk, Tomás, who penned a mysterious illustrated manuscript, recently unearthed in a bog. The tattered “Bog Book” is “a mulchy brown mess,” and Eddie’s painstakingly trying to piece it back together while his widowed father struggles to decipher it.
Pignat expertly weaves the monk’s dramatic story between chapters concerning Finn and Eddie. She shares the youths’ growing emotional bond and mutual mission to find “the legendary Cauldron” (that’s long obsessed Eddie’s father), Irish lore, adventure, Viking invasions, archaeology, and more than a wee bit of magic. The Ottawa writer drops a major plot twist almost 350 pages into the story, which makes the tale even more compelling.
The Irish are storytellers, and Pignat, who was born in Ireland and raised mostly in Canada, frequently honours the art and importance of story with lines like “My chapter may come to an end, but the tale always continues in the telling” and “̒There is no greater truth than tales if you but dig a little beneath the surface’”. She even includes an Irish legend, “The Children of Lir,” within the novel. And the Irish lilt is frequently present, ie: “Affection has many faces, so it does.”
Pignat paints early Dublin viscerally and credibly, and in an interview included at the back of the book, she explains that “Often [her] settings are as important to the story as the characters.” Here is Pignat’s Dublin:
The city smelled like a soup of many simmering things—engines and horseshit, blacksmiths’ soot and bakers’ buns, butchers’ blood-covered sawdust, that ever-changing stink of a crowd, all cigarette smoke, pomade, perfume, and workingmen’s sweat, the unmistakable hint of malt and barley from what brewed at the Guinness factory, and of course, under it all, that briny scent of the sea.
This fast-paced, well-researched book transported me and I thoroughly enjoyed all things Irish while I was away, and Finn’s important discovery that “though the way be winding, it gets you there. Eventually.”
SaskBook Reviews
- Review by Shelley A. Leedahl
My first surprise was that the title character is a girl. Fifteen-year-old Finn lives rough on the streets of 1913 Dublin. She “was in the business of surviving,” which included pickpocketing, and “lying was Finn’s mother tongue.” The scrawny lass has no memory of family, is targeted by another young urchin, Dooley, and—when she can escape the Woodhall Workhouse orphanage where she’s kept in a medicated fog—she sleeps beneath “a rusted sheet of metal,” cold, hungry, and among rats.
This lively book’s two other important characters are Eddie, a lonely apprentice archaeologist (under his archaeologist father) at the National Museum, and the 9th century monk, Tomás, who penned a mysterious illustrated manuscript, recently unearthed in a bog. The tattered “Bog Book” is “a mulchy brown mess,” and Eddie’s painstakingly trying to piece it back together while his widowed father struggles to decipher it.
Pignat expertly weaves the monk’s dramatic story between chapters concerning Finn and Eddie. She shares the youths’ growing emotional bond and mutual mission to find “the legendary Cauldron” (that’s long obsessed Eddie’s father), Irish lore, adventure, Viking invasions, archaeology, and more than a wee bit of magic. The Ottawa writer drops a major plot twist almost 350 pages into the story, which makes the tale even more compelling.
The Irish are storytellers, and Pignat, who was born in Ireland and raised mostly in Canada, frequently honours the art and importance of story with lines like “My chapter may come to an end, but the tale always continues in the telling” and “̒There is no greater truth than tales if you but dig a little beneath the surface’”. She even includes an Irish legend, “The Children of Lir,” within the novel. And the Irish lilt is frequently present, ie: “Affection has many faces, so it does.”
Pignat paints early Dublin viscerally and credibly, and in an interview included at the back of the book, she explains that “Often [her] settings are as important to the story as the characters.” Here is Pignat’s Dublin:
The city smelled like a soup of many simmering things—engines and horseshit, blacksmiths’ soot and bakers’ buns, butchers’ blood-covered sawdust, that ever-changing stink of a crowd, all cigarette smoke, pomade, perfume, and workingmen’s sweat, the unmistakable hint of malt and barley from what brewed at the Guinness factory, and of course, under it all, that briny scent of the sea.
This fast-paced, well-researched book transported me and I thoroughly enjoyed all things Irish while I was away, and Finn’s important discovery that “though the way be winding, it gets you there. Eventually.”
SaskBook Reviews
- Review by Shelley A. Leedahl