I get so annoyed by comments that make us book readers look like such rabid crazies.

Nope. One of the major failings is this lapse in common sense communication.

It's a shame that with all the other fleshing-out-of-plotlines in the TV series that they couldn't find something a little more substantial for Laoghaire's nasty plotting to stand on. The unrequited love bit was rather passé in the book too.

I wish they hadn't left out the context - in the book, she and Frank have been trying and struggling to conceive, so there is a sense of personal loss bound up in the sadness over this unknown child's death.