Critical illness inspired children’s author

A Kilconnell woman who enjoyed the therapeutic effects of writing while undergoing treatment for breast cancer has self-published her first children’s novel – drawing on Celtic mythology and the West of Ireland for material.

Siobhán Lally, a nurse in Bons Secours Galway, now lives in Loughrea with her husband and four children and says the idea for her book, The Violet Mist, came to her when the family’s pet lamb Leo died.

“When he died, we were all just devastated – I’m not from a farming background so this lamb was like a puppy to us. Soon afterwards, I just came across this picture of Fairy Queen Oonagh of Connacht and standing beside her was a lamb,” she recalls, adding that Knockma is a central location for the story.

That discovery set her on a mission to research Queen Oonagh and it was from that she unearthed a range of old Irish mythical characters – An Tuatha de Danann who are now known as the Sidhe were part of that and form a significant part of her story.

“Over the next couple of months, I read everything I could and visited sacred sites around Ireland that were connected to this mystical race. I had never considered myself a writer but in the summer of 2014, drawing on my own characters – mainly my children and their pets, An Tuatha de Danann and a great deal of imagination, The Violet Mist started to take shape,” says Siobhán.

See the full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune – on sale in shops from this Wednesday. Or you can download the digital edition from www.connachttribune.ie