A-Z Blogging Challenge - N is for Neve

 My imaginary interview with Neve, the heroine of ‘Her Only Option’, set in Egypt.

  

I’m now on the Lady Nadia cruise ship, waiting in the lobby to interview tour guide Neve Dalton. Ah, I can see her now, running down the stairs – oh dear, she doesn’t look very happy …

Has something upset you, Neve?

I’ll say it has! I went up to the sundeck for some peace and quiet until my next tour group arrives, and next I know, I’m being chatted up one of those cruise ship Casanovas – you know, the smooth-talking posers who think female tour guides are an easy target. And this one had the nerve to say tour guides churn out half-baked facts from inaccurate guide books!

I take it you weren’t impressed?

Well … (Neve blushes) … he was rather good-looking, with amazing blue eyes - but then he tried to claim he was an archaeologist. Huh! Probably one of those dilettantes who think they can make the discovery of a lifetime without any effort. Anyway, enough about him. I’m only thankful he’s on the Lady Amirah and not the Nadia, although I don’t envy my friend Joanne having to put up with him on this week’s cruise.

Er – how did you meet him if he’s on a different ship?

Oh, haven’t you been up to the sundeck? The Nile cruise ships have to be moored 3 or 4 abreast because there are so many here in Luxor, and they’re built to the same design, so the sundecks are level. Joanne and I often meet up to have a chat over the rails.

Let me ask you more about yourself and Joanne. I believe you’re both Cambridge postgraduates, so why did you decide to become Nile cruise ship guides?

We both felt we needed a break from the academic life. This job with the Rahman cruise line has given me the opportunity to return to Egypt where I grew up, and to share my passion for Ancient Egypt.

I understand you’ve been dating Malik Rahman.

(Neve narrows her eyes) I hope you’re not going to make some derogatory comment about me dating the boss’s son?

I wouldn’t dream of doing that!

I like Malik, he’s –well, as Joanne has said, he’s good-looking, charming, worships the ground I walk on, and he’s filthy rich, but—

But you’re not in love with him?

I can’t be, can I? Otherwise I’d have accepted his proposal.

So he’s asked you to marry him?

Oh yes, several times. But, between you and me, I think the only reason for his proposals is because his father won’t give him any senior role in the company until he’s ‘settled’ - which to Sabry means married with a whole brood of sons to inherit the Rahman empire. And I’m not ready to settle down as a wife and mother. Anyway, if you’ll excuse me now, I need to go and warn Joanne about that annoying self-styled archaeologist she’ll have to put up with on the Lady Amirah this week. Bye!

 

I wonder if Neve will change her mind about that annoying self-styled archaeologist? 

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A-Z Blogging Challenge - M is for Mist Na Mara

Mist Na Mara house is a product of my imagination. It was the house Jenna and Guy jointly inherited in Irish Inheritance, and from the moment I started the novel, I could see it in my mind.

Here’s the heroine’s first view of the front of the house:

Built of grey stone, Mist Na Mara House had a central doorway, flanked on both sides by long sash windows and, at each end of the frontage, large square bay windows on the ground and upper floors.

I knew roughly where the house was situated (near Clifden in the west of Ireland) but had to ignore the fact that this area only has a few isolated stone cottages, and some modern white bungalows. This was where I wanted my house to be, so I put it there anyway!

And this was the view from the front of the house:

Jenna turned and let her eyes take in the panoramic view. Not only did they overlook the narrow bay and the low green hills on the far shore, but they were high enough to see another stretch of water beyond and some larger hills. On their left were the peaks of the Twelve Bens, and to their right, broken by a few rocky islets, was the vast grey expanse of the Atlantic Ocean.

The inside of the house was sharply focused in my mind, too:

Once inside, she stared around, hardly able to take in the elegance of the large hallway with oak wainscoting and polished parquet floor. In the centre stood a rosewood pedestal table on an ornately carved column, and a crystal chandelier sparkled in the sun’s rays through the arched fanlight above the door. On each side of the hallway were two solid oak doors, much broader than modern doorways. Ahead of them, a wide wooden staircase curved upwards, with a brass handrail and wrought iron balusters, and a corridor at the side of the stairs led to the back of the house.

And, of course, there was the bedroom which had been locked for over 70 years, and my hero and heroine were the first to see it, but I won’t post any spoilers here about that!

Originally I called the house Sea Mist House – but then  discovered there was a hotel with that name in Clifden. One of my friends in Dublin (thank you, Ellen Brickley!) came to my rescue, with the half-English, half Irish name of Mist Na Mara – meaning ‘mist of the sea’.

The house has played a part in all my Irish novels, as it became an arts and drama/dance centre, and gained a large extension, a restored cottage, and also a barn conversion. I am now so familiar with the place, I find it hard sometimes to remember it is not actually a ‘real’ place.

Imagination is definitely a wonderful thing! And one comment by a reviewer was especially pleasing: The description of the old house, Mist Na Mara, was excellent. I walked around the house in my head, I could picture the bedrooms, the kitchen, and even the drive up to it.

It’s great when something you have invented captures someone else’s imagination!

By the way, I’ve never (yet) found a photo of a house that matches my vision of Mist Na Mara, so maybe it really is a ‘one-off’!

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A-Z Blogging Challenge - L is for Luke

Luke Sullivan is the ‘hero’ of my novel ‘Irish Intrigue’ –and I decided he was a veterinary surgeon in the west of Ireland.

I probably know less about veterinary work than I do about volcanoes (one of my other heroes’ speciality). I think I visited my local vet less than half a dozen times when I had a cat (which was over 20 years ago). I also remember watching a popular TV series here about a vet in Yorkshire, but that was set in the 1930s and 1940s, and obviously things have changed a lot since then. Therefore I had a lot of research to do for this story.

That included spending the whole one Sunday afternoon watching YouTube videos of foals being born.

Here’s the scene that resulted from the YouTube videos:

Charley followed Jan into an inner office where a bank of black and white screens covered one wall. Jan pointed to one of them. “That’s Duchess in her birthing box. She’s very restless, so I don’t think it’ll be long now.”

Charley caught a glimpse of Luke running experienced hands around the mare’s swollen belly before he disappeared out of camera range. Soon afterwards, he came into the office, followed by Rory.

“Best to let her get on with it now,” Luke said. “I don’t want her holding on to the foal because we’re standing there watching her.”

“Could she do that?” she asked.

“It’s quite common. In fact—” He peered at the screen. “If I’m not mistaken, she’s started to expel the birth sac. See, she was waiting for us to leave her alone.”

They all watched as the mare rose clumsily to her feet and walked a few steps. When she turned, the white sac was visible.

Rory peered at the screen. “Come on, Duchess,” he whispered.

“You can see the foal’s hoof now,” Jan said.

They bunched around the screen, and Charley held her breath as the foal’s forelegs appeared.

“This was when things went wrong last time,” Luke whispered in her ear. “The head was positioned wrongly, and she couldn’t push it out.”

The tension in the office was palpable as the mare strained, until with one heaving contraction, the foal’s head started to appear.

Luke blew out his breath. “Whoa, almost home and dry now.”

When the head was fully out, he raised his clenched fist in triumph, and Rory punched the air.

As well as horses, I researched medical problems of sheep, cats and dogs, and even a goldfish with a cyst on its eye! I also consulted the ‘experts’, with a visit to a local veterinary clinic. When I explained the reason for my visit, the receptionist and nurse couldn’t have been more helpful and we chatted for over half an hour. Mind you, they did exchange glances when I asked them about their policy and practice concerning controlled drugs (an essential part of my novel) and I had to reassure them that I had no intention of breaking in and stealing any drugs!

If I had only written about ‘what I know’, I would have missed the fascination of discovering a lot of interesting information about veterinary work. Although the research can take time (often many hours), in the end it can actually prove more satisfying than only writing about what you already know.

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A-Z Blogging Challenge - K is for Kara

 Kara is the lead character in my novel ‘Irish Secrets’.

I had no ideas for my third Irish novel until a character in the second novel, ‘Irish Intrigue’ handed the idea to me!

In this excerpt, Charley and Luke are talking to Nick, a well-known screen writer, about his next project:

“What kind of movie are you envisioning?” Charley asked. “A romance, or mystery, or what?”

“Maybe a mixture. You’ve heard of the Magdalene laundries?”

Luke grimaced. “Not one of the best aspects of our Irish history.”

“Not only Ireland, Luke. Other countries had them, too, where unmarried mothers were forced to give up their babies. There’ve been a couple of movies about mothers trying to find their children later in life, but I’d like to concentrate on one of the babies. A girl adopted by an American family learns about her birth mother, comes to Ireland, but meets a wall of secrecy.”

From that, the idea began to germinate in my mind of an American girl coming over to Ireland to find her birth mother. I read many heart-breaking accounts of the babies who were forcibly adopted trying in later life to find their birth parents, as well as stories of mothers trying to trace what happened to the babies which were taken from them. Occasionally, you hear of a ‘success story’ when mother and child are reunited, but for thousands more, a wall of secrecy surrounds the adoptions. The film ‘Philomena’ is one example of such a mother, and the book it is based on gives more detail of the son who was taken from her. ‘The Magdalene Sisters’ shows the appalling and inhumane treatment of three unmarried mothers in the 1960s in one of the Magdalene laundries.

 

Because of timing and ages, I decided to have Kara’s mother as the baby who was adopted by an American couple in the early 1960s. When Kara discovers this, she embarks on a quest to find her mother’s family, but soon realises it will not be an easy task.

Here’s an excerpt from Irish Secrets describing Kara’s visit to the Convent:

The elderly nun who opened the door of the Convent of the Sisters of Calvary didn’t even smile as she snapped, “Good afternoon. Can I help you?”

Kara’s heart sank. Judging by the severe expression on the nun’s angular, lined face, she didn’t hold out much hope of getting any help from her. Still, it was worth a try.

She mustered a friendly smile. “Hello. I’m Kara Stewart, and I’m interested in any information you may be able to give me about my mother who was born at the Ballykane home for mothers and babies.”

“Who told you to come here?”

“Erm—no one. I—” Taken aback by the nun’s sharp question, Kara faltered before rushing into an explanation. “I’ve spoken to Sister Mary Teresa in the hospital, and she suggested I write to Sister Augusta, but I already did that and didn’t receive a reply, so when I saw the sign pointing here to the convent, I hoped I may be able to speak to Sister Augusta in person.”

“Sister Augusta doesn’t receive visitors.”

“But how can I find out anything more about my mother’s birth when she didn’t answer my letter?”

“If she didn’t reply, it means she hasn’t found any records relating to the name you gave her.”

The nun, whose name badge showed her to be Sister Gabriel, started to close the door, but Kara persisted. “Sister, if your mother had been born at one of the mother and baby homes, wouldn’t you want to know more about her, and about her mother? Especially if the child was taken away from the mother and sent to adoptive parents in America.”

Sister Gabriel remained stony-faced. “We have a duty to uphold our guarantee of confidentiality to the mothers, many of whom were in their teens when they committed the mortal sin of bearing a child out of wedlock. They were given the opportunity to put their unfortunate experience behind them, and any revelation now of their guilty secret may disrupt, even destroy, the lives they have made for themselves since then.”

“I see. So even if Sister Augusta traced my mother’s birth, she probably wouldn’t reply to me, because she has to protect the unmarried mother. Is that what you’re saying?”

“It is. Now, will that be all, Miss Stewart?”

“I guess so. Thank you for your time, Sister Gabriel.”

 It’s only with the help from undercover detective Ryan Brady that Kara is eventually able to trace her birth-grandmother, but more problems arise when Kara’s mother is not interested in what she has discovered.

While working at Mist Na Mara Arts Centre, Kara Stewart embarks on a search for her mother’s birth parents; she’d been adopted in the 1960s by an American couple. Kara soon realises the task is not as simple as she’d anticipated when she’s met with a wall of secrecy surrounding Irish baby adoptions.

Ryan Brady is hiding the secret of his real identity, but when he offers to help Kara trace her Irish family, his attraction to her is undeniable.

As the mystery unravels, secrets drive a wedge, not only between Kara and her mother, but also between Kara and Ryan.

Can Kara and Ryan find a way to heal the rifts created by all these secrets and find love?

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A-Z Blogging Challenge - J is for Jenna

Jenna is the ‘heroine’ of my first ‘Mist Na Mara’ novel, Irish Inheritance. At the beginning of the story, she is an out-of-work actress, working in a coffee shop to make ends meet, and sharing a house in London with three friends. All I really knew when I started writing this book was that she inherited a house in the west of Ireland from someone she had never heard of, and her co-inheritor was also someone she’d never heard of!

Here’s the start of Chapter 1:

“A house in Ireland?” Jenna Sutton stared over the mahogany desk at the lawyer. “Someone I’ve never heard of has left me a house in Ireland?"

The white-haired lawyer peered over his steel-rimmed spectacles. “A half share of the house, Ms. Sutton. Along with a half share of what, at current exchange rates, amounts to approximately fifty thousand pounds.”

Jenna shook her head and swiped several strands of her hair back behind her ear. “I don’t understand, Mr. Moore. Why would this Helena—what did you say her name was?”

“Miss Helena Keating.”

“Why has she left me a house and twenty-five thousand pounds? How does she even know about me?”

“Ms. Sutton, I can only give you the information passed to me by the law firm of Daniel McGrath in Dublin. We were instructed to find any descendants of James Oliver Sutton—"

“My grandfather.”

“Yes, and as far as we can ascertain, you are his sole descendant. I understand your father died in an automobile accident about twenty years ago. My condolences.”

“Thanks, but I was six when he died and only have some vague memories of him.” She frowned. “Do you know what the link is between this woman and my grandfather?”

“That wasn’t part of our instructions.”

“Have you any information about her?”

Mr. Moore pushed his glasses back up his nose and flipped through the papers in the blue manila folder on his desk. “Miss Keating was born in 1920 in County Galway, Ireland, and died last year in Dalkey, near Dublin, where she has lived since 1940.”

“So she was—” She did a quick calculation in her head. “About fifteen years older than my grandfather.”

The lawyer picked up another sheet of paper. “Yes, he was born in April, 1936.”

“I wasn’t aware he knew anyone in Ireland, and I’m pretty sure he never went over there. He lived his whole life in a small village in Kent.”

She couldn’t imagine her grandfather being anyone’s toy boy either. He’d been devoted to her grandmother. So what on earth was his connection with this Irish woman?

Another thought occurred to her, and she looked at Mr. Moore again. “You said I had a half share of the house and the fifty thousand pounds.” Even saying the words seemed surreal. She hadn’t yet wrapped her mind around what the money meant. “Who gets the other half?”

“I’m sorry, Ms. Sutton. I don’t have that information. The Dublin law firm is dealing with the estate. Our job was simply to—”

“Yes, okay, to find the descendants of my grandfather.”

“I’m sure Mr. McGrath will be able to tell you more when you meet him in Dublin.”

“When I meet him in—whoa, who says I’m going to meet him?”

“Mr. McGrath has suggested an appointment at two-thirty on May 10th, to be followed by a visit to the house the next day.” 

So what will Jenna discover about the house, her unknown benefactor, and her co-inheritor when she goes over to Dublin?

Irish Inheritance is currently FREE on Amazon

All my books are available from Amazon  or from Tirgearr Publishing

A-Z Blogging Challenge - I is for Iceland

Write about what you know, they say – but I broke that so-called ‘rule’ twice in my novel ‘Changing the Future.’

How? Because Paul, my hero, was a volcano expert, and because a volcano in Iceland seemed to be emerging from its dormant phase.

Originally, the hero was a Geography teacher, but I decided I needed something more high profile for him. At the time I was writing the story, the Icelandic volcano with that unpronounceable name (Eyjafjallajökull) was erupting and causing huge disruption to air travel with an ash cloud that led to the closure of Northern Europe airspace for several days.

So I decided my hero should be a volcanologist. Only one problem with that – all I remembered from my schooldays was that volcanoes erupt from time to time. Hence I spent many hours researching volcanoes, how they’re formed, why they erupt, and the resulting effects. I probably only used about 5% of what I learnt, but hopefully it was enough for Paul to sound like an expert. I also gave the volcano a more pronounceable name!

Here’s an excerpt when Lisa is watching Paul on television:

Paul was being interviewed at Manchester Airport. “Yes, Mount Lakuda’s providing us with some interesting developments at the moment. There’s been quite an increase of activity this past week.”

“And when you get to Iceland, what are the main things you’ll be doing?” the interviewer asked.

“I’ll be working with the scientists at the Iceland Volcano Research Centre. I was out there a couple of weeks ago and I’ve been in close contact with Dr. Kristjan Dagsson, the head of the Centre.”

“There are reports of a bulge on the side of the volcano. How significant is this?”

“On its own, a swelling wouldn’t be considered serious. Plenty of volcanoes develop these bulges, which indicate the movement of magma, often several miles below the surface. We’re more concerned about the heightened level of seismic activity and sulfur dioxide levels.”

“I understand there have been several earthquakes in the last few weeks.”

“What we call an earthquake swarm, yes, a lot of small tremors, but none with a magnitude higher than three. Scientists at the Centre have been working around the clock analysing and interpreting the data from all the sensory equipment on Mount Lakuda, and I’ll be joining them.”

“Is this the build-up to a full-scale eruption?”

“Not necessarily.” Paul smiled. “It’s being monitored carefully but it’s very difficult to predict whether this activity will lead to any major eruption.”

The interviewer persisted. “If it does erupt, is there likely to be an ash cloud like the one which caused such major disruption to air traffic?”

“The ash cloud was due to a combination of factors, mainly linked to the jet stream, none of which are present in the case of Mount Lakuda.”

“Thank you, Dr. Hamilton.” The interviewer turned to face the camera again. “Dr Paul Hamilton, a leading authority on volcanoes, was talking about Mount Lakuda in Iceland.

 I also had to research Iceland, because I’ve never been there. From basic information such as the name of Iceland’s main airport (Keflavik) and the distance from there to Reykjavik, to more detailed facts about the roads and off-road terrain in Iceland, the scenery, and the geographical location of Iceland’s volcanoes. I studied maps and hundreds of photos and videos. Google Earth proved very useful, and also Streetview, which enabled me to ‘drive’ along some of the roads in Iceland.

In the end, I think (hope!) I gave a fairly accurate portrayal of Iceland in my novel. At least no one has told me (yet!) I’ve made any howling errors, but I did keep my descriptions fairly brief, just in case!

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A-Z Blogging Challenge - H is for 'Hunger' Memorials

Although the memorials in Ireland commemorating the tragic consequences of the potato blight in the 1840s are usually known as Famine Memorials, I am using the word Hunger here. Not just because it fits with H in the A-Z Challenge, but also because the Irish words ‘An Gorta Mór’ mean The Great Hunger.

Without going into all the politics of that time, suffice to say there was actually plenty of food in Ireland even when the potato crop failed for two consecutive years. However, foodstuffs were still being exported from Ireland to England during this period, and the price of any available food increased beyond the means of the poorest section of the population.

Landowners (often English) evicted non-payers of rent, who were then faced with the choice of entering the already crowded (and disease-ridden) workhouses, doing public work such as building roads for a pittance and relying on soup kitchens, or emigrating.

There are memorials to this tragic period in hundreds of towns and villages in Ireland. Sometimes they consist of a plaque showing where a workhouse once stood, or a Celtic cross in a graveyard, or by mass graves/burial pits where thousands of victims were buried.

In my novel Irish Echoes, historian Elliot Quinn is commissioned to write an article about some of the most evocative memorials. Professional photographer Rachel Pearse agrees to accompany him, despite the contentious issues between them. Here are some of the memorials they visited.

This sculpture on Customs House Quay in Dublin shows ragged and starving people trekking along the quay to board one of the ships which would take them to Britain, or to America, Canada, or Australia. Sadly, many of them did not survive the voyage.

 

Elliot and Rachel’s first stop was at Athy in County Kildare. The original workhouse there is now a hospital, and at the entrance is a sculpture carved from bog oak, named Famine Family. It represents a final hopeless embrace, since they knew they would not see each other again once they entered the workhouse.

The workhouse in Kilkenny has been converted to a shopping centre but in the Famine Memorial Garden outside the centre is a bronze sculpture. It shows two young brothers, John and Patrick Saul, who were abandoned by their parents at the docks in Dublin. They decided to walk back to their home in Clonmel, but after trekking over 70 miles, they sought refuge in the workhouse in Kilkenny.

 

The Ennistymon memorial was erected in 1995, in memory of the victims of the Great Hunger. It is located across from a deserted workhouse, where an estimated 20,000 Irish people died, and a mass graveyard for children, who perished and were buried without coffins.

The two grey stone slabs depict workhouse doors with large iron hinges. In front of one is a sculpture of a small barefoot boy with his hands raised as if imploring to be admitted. On the other is the head of his anguished mother, two clenched hands, and an inscription.

The inscription contains the words from a note that was pinned to the torn shirt of a barefoot orphan boy, who was left at the workhouse door on the freezing cold morning of February 25, 1848.

On the shore of Clew Bay in County Mayo is the National Famine Memorial, which depicts a “coffin ship” with skeleton bodies in the rigging. Coffin ships was a term used to describethe horrendously overcrowded boats which left Ireland with emigrants fleeing the famine in dire and unhygienic conditions 

A rough stone cross in the Doolough Valley in County Mayo commemorates a tragic event in in 1849 when people in the town of Louisburgh were starving. It was rumoured that if they walked 12 miles to Delphi Lodge where the council guardians were, they would be given food. The malnourished people set out on March 30th, 1849, in atrocious weather conditions, with wind and freezing rain, many walking barefoot and with only blankets or shawls for protection. When they eventually reached Delphi Lodge the next morning, they were told the guardians could not be disturbed while they were having their lunch. When they eventually did see them, the people were sent away empty-handed and it is estimated that more than 400 people died on the fatiguing journey back through that night and into the next day.

Every year, a memorial walk from Louisburgh to Doolough is held, and often members of the Choctaw tribe take part – which brings us to this  memorial:

 

Kindred Spirits in County Cork is a memorial to the Choctaw tribe of Oklahoma, who in 1847 raised $170 from their meagre resources to send to the Irish famine relief fund. Sixteen years earlier, they had taken part in their own 500-mile ‘Trail of Tears’ when they were forced to move from their ancestral lands in Mississippi to Oklahoma. Thousands died from starvation, exposure, and disease.
Their donation to the Irish only came to light in the 1980s, but since then the links between the Choctaw and the Irish have grown, with exchange visits. Last year, the Irish contributed the majority of the $3 million raised for the Navajo/Hopi tribes who were suffering a devastating outbreak of the Covid virus.

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