The Irish setting is used to great effect in JoAnn Ross’s Fair Haven. This is a warm and touching romance between Michael Joyce and Dr. Erin O’Halloran who have both seen far too much of war and hatred. Their love for a mutual friend who is dying brings them together where they discover each other and re-discover their connection to the outside world.

Michael Joyce was a Pulitzer-prize winning photojournalist whose images from combat zones all over the world have brought fame. But Michael is suffering from a textbook case of burnout. He has lost his faith in God and in his fellow man. He refuses to touch a camera lens and has retreated to an isolated farm in the small town of Castelough in the west of Ireland where the most exciting thing that happens to him is his rescue of a lost sheep. Michael swears he is happy in his isolated, celibate life, but he is only half-alive.

Erin O’Halloran is a doctor who has spent a number of years caring for civilians caught in wars and insurrections. She is as tired and burned out as Michael; she suffers from bad dreams and is in need of healing.

The two meet when Erin she goes to Ireland to help her dear friend and fellow doctor, Tom Flannery. Tom was gassed while on duty in Afghanistan and the chemicals he was exposed to are causing kidney failure. He knows and accepts that he is dying but wants to keep helping his patients as long as he can. Tom and Michael are childhood friends and he asks Michael to rent his small cottage, Fair Haven, to Erin.

Michael begins to come back to the world when he finds out that he has an 8 year old daughter, Shea, born out of a brief affair he had with a fiery Belfast woman. She was killed for marrying outside her religion and Shea’s grandmother wants nothing to do with her grandchild. Shea is a wan, fey little girl who talks a lot about her guardian angel Mary Margaret and her guardian angel dog too.

In Fair Haven, Michael and Erin connect as a couple. They also rediscover the importance of community. The people in the small town of Castelough all are instrumental in playing a part to heal these two wounded people. Erin discovers the joys of using her medical training to help people who are not under constant threat of war. She feels a kinship with Michael in that they both have seen more horrors than can be imagined. That bond and their mutual friendship with Tom bring them together, and the bond that they form with the people and village of Castelough only strengthens their own connection.

As long as Fair Haven stayed grounded in reality, I enjoyed it very much. But I couldn’t suspend my disbelief enough to accept the touches of fey that are sprinkled throughout the book. Michael (and Erin) sometimes find themselves talking to the ghost of his dead father. Erin has dreams where she finds herself taking the part of the heroine in an old Irish legend. Finally, Shea and her guardian angel was a bit too twee and precious. Normally, I have no problems with paranormal elements, but I thought Ross’s depiction of the village and people of Castelough was so strong and engaging that it didn’t need fairy elements.

Despite the problem I had with the paranormal elements, I did thoroughly enjoy Fair Haven. It is warm and touching and features a village full of interesting characters whom I wanted to get to know better. Lovers of books with Irish setting will take this one to their hearts.