Although I was born in Islington, the place my family called home was a small village in County Kerry. It was where my mother was born and where my father – an Offaly man himself - grew to love.  It’s not surprising then that I chose North London and South West Ireland as the location for my first novel.

The characters in A Good Confession are works of imagination. Thady never stomped through the fields of my childhood and I didn’t meet Kitty pawing the fruit and veg in Chapel Market. But the places are real. I grew up in the kitchen under the eaves where Cathleen and Father Jerry first fell in love and went to the Church where he offered Mass.

Chance to write

My first job was for The Universe, a Catholic newspaper housed in a Fleet Street office that could have been lifted straight from the pages of Dickens. I opened the post, ran errands and brewed the tea. I was also given the chance to make appalling mistakes on an ancient typewriter. It was a good place to learn how to write.

Inspirational

I joined the Daily Mirror a couple of years later and stayed for an unbelievably long time. I gave welfare advice to readers and campaigned on their behalf if there was a case to answer, using the power of the Daily Mirror’s name. I replied to the lovelorn for agony aunt Marje Proops and was a researcher for Paul Foot, the inspirational investigative journalist who helped to right so many miscarriages of justice.

That was then. Find out what I am up to now by clicking here.