‘A broken life can be mended….’
Today I am delighted to shine a spotlight on Mending Lace, a story of love, loss and redemption, by Irish writer Sheila Forsey. Sheila joined me recently on my #IrishWritersWed feature (Read more HERE) and I am only too delighted to welcome her back with an extract from Mending Lace and…….
..the fabulous news, that for a very limited time Mending Lace is NOW ONLY 99p on Kindle. (Purchase Link)
Please do continue reading for an extract from the prologue of Mending Lace and details about the book and about Sheila herself.
Book Blurb:
A story of love, loss and redemption, Mending Lace is a wonderfully woven story of people coming to terms with who they are, what they want, and all they have learned along the way.
Sive and Dan Gallagher are devoted to each other. Living the dream in a beautiful old house that Sive has spent the last few years restoring.
Set on the grounds of the house is Sive’s haven, an artist’s studio built for her by Dan. Dan’s business is going from strength to strength and they are doing very well financially – or at least that’s what Sive believes.
But their marriage is tested to its very core when Dan has a car accident. As Dan fights to recover, Sive unravels a trail of deceit and financial chaos that has the power to destroy them. The comfortable life Sive has grown accustomed to evaporates.
Sive’s life is further complicated by Dan’s mother, a formidable woman who rules her clan with an iron fist and has little time for Sive, who she thinks is in a cult because of her bohemian lifestyle, a cult she blames for her son’s downward spiral.
But as Sive puts the pieces together, she learns the Gallagher clan are hiding a secret, one that will change all of them forever…
Vincent van Gogh, Museum of Modern Art, New York.
Shame. A man could be ruled by it. It may not be of his making but passed on to him to carry. Or it could be something he has hidden and one day it becomes too much, he cannot hide or carry it any longer.
A sliver of a moon lights the ocean and the flicker of light from Tuskar Rock comes in flashes across the sea, a beacon of hope in the darkened skies. I wonder what other poor souls have the waves taken? Are they at peace now or do they still walk this Wexford Coastline searching for answers? Perhaps they are more like one of these sea shells under my feet, just a memory of a different time, a different place and a different man?
After the tears and the regrets will I just be someone who once was? A brother, a son, or a husband. I wonder how mother will handle the shame? She can’t put a twist on this one. Shame, there it is again, my old enemy. I thought I was done with it then. November 1996. But here it is again, twenty years later, back to haunt me.
Sive, my life, my beautiful Sive. My heart is breaking with leaving you. This is not what I promised, will you think I abandoned you?
Maybe if there was a child things would look different. We put too much on hold, Sive. I thought I had it all sorted. The big plan. A child, imagine it, maybe even a little girl. She would look like you, black curls and dark eyes, like a fairy of long ago. When she would smile, she would take your breath away.
The first time I saw you, you took my breath away, like the beautiful Doolin coast that surrounded you. You are my everything. Please remember how we once were. When it’s all over, will you go back to your beloved Burren and spend your days painting that rugged land, hating me for leaving? I can’t bare to think of you being alone. Forgive me.
I have always loved the smell of the saltwater but now it smells of nothing, it’s as if I am here yet not here, already gone. Will this be too much for you to carry Sive? I want you to be able to live your life, learn to love again.
I was here before, I should have told you but I couldn’t. I was afraid you would see me differently. Maybe I have misjudged you, have I misjudged us? I should have trusted our marriage. What am I doing? Maybe it’s not too late. What the hell am I doing here?
‘Where are you God? Where the hell are you? Help me! Give my head some peace.’ The howl of the wind is getting stronger now, the waves crashing in. When I am gone and everyone I ever knew is long gone and a new generation lives, will the sea and the wind remain the same? The same as when our forefathers lived? What had it been like for them? Had they had hardship too in their lives? But their lives are over, I am still here, my life to live.
I need to leave here. It is still my time. My life. I must get out of here. I need to talk to you Sive. I need to tell you. Tell you everything.
To continue reading, you can buy a copy HERE
Meet The Author:
Sheila Forsey’s debut novel was published last year and made The Irish Times Best Sellers list. A contemporary novel, titled, ‘Mending Lace.’ She is now officially a full-time writer. That is, in between running around after a teenager and two younger kids, three dogs, two cats called Ginger Rogers and Doris Day, fourteen hens and a cockerel called Oscar, that persists in crowing at four in the morning. She lives a mile from the village that she grew up in, on the coast of Wexford. At the heart of her village is a small theatre. She reflects that it has added a huge tapestry of plays and performances to her world from a very early age. She adores all things theatrical and her novel writing is now her theatre, on a page. She is addicted to tea, pecan pastries, old movies, reading about the past and finding crumbly old houses to visit, especially if they have a ghostly past within their walls.
Sheila is PRO for Wexford Literary Festival.
Twitter ~ @SheilaForsey
I bought the paperback of this, it’s sitting by my bedside. won’t be long now! X
Great to hear Adrienne. Hard to keep up with the tbr x