Coming out in SIX days... Dad's Red Dress

Next Wednesday my first novel, Dad's Red Dress, comes out. 

Amazing cover by Aoife Henkes

Really excited and slightly nervous, but  it feels as if this is a story that has really wanted to be written. Not just because it's a strong story but because I've had the idea for it since the early 80s. I only wrote the story, finally, in 2002. It was a feature script. That was my main form of writing at that stage. It got a huge amount of traction and interest, even a bit of competition from two German production companies who both wanted it.



The winning one, well they only found out about it by accident when I told the story to someone at the Galway Film Fleadh having no idea she was a producer! 

Finally, it was all set to be made in 2005, an Irish-German co-production. Then the rules about funding changed in Germany and it faltered at the starting line. 

A few years ago, a little disillusioned at the number of scripts scowling at me from the shelves - that everyone liked but couldn't raise funding on - I started to turn some of them into books, starting with the family features. 

Dad's Red Dress danced into prose and revelled in the freedom of it! 

So what's it about: 

Jessie wants her family to be normal. Really normal. Boringly so.

Thing is her kid sister, Laura thinks she’s been abducted by the Virgin Mary – twice; once on a motorbike with a pink afro; her step-mum makes nude sculptures and her dad becomes Mandy when the door closes.

Having just moved back to Ireland from California, Jessie is determined that nobody at school will find out about her dad's cross-dressing. Not because she minds but because when they do, bullying inevitably follows and she wants to protect herself and Laura. 

Trouble is, she's not really in control of what happens next and things are about to get a whole lot more complicated... 

So now, after waiting over 30 years (scary how time speeds up!), Dad's Red Dress is available to pre-order on Amazon here.

You can also keep track of what's happening on 
Twitter: @DadsRedDress

Facebook:  Dad's Red Dress

More soon on where the idea came from, on adaptation, on the self-publishing lark (and all the other little birds that twitter while you try and make sense of the journey), feedback from early readers and tips for keeping your imagination and hopes alive coming up here soon...