Children of the Shore
Growing up in Dingle in the 50s and 60s
John O’Connor’s description of growing up Dingle, Co Kerry, presents a town quite unlike the thriving tourist mecca it is today. John grew up in the 1950s and 1960s, a time when poverty was rife in an Ireland that the Catholic Church ruled with an iron fist.
Hardship was evident in many households in the town where several families in want scraped a livelihood against the backdrop of the uncertainty of the times. Yet, despite the hardship of these years, the experiences that left the greatest imprint on the author are those of the camaraderie he shared with his nine siblings in their home on the shore of Dingle Bay, and the friendships he found among his peers as they nourished their impoverished lives with their rich imaginations.
The reader can’t but be captivated by the sheer energy and sense of adventure with which O’Connor, his siblings and friends faced each day. The harshness of their physical life honed their survival skills and the strong friendships they formed sustained them, as did the outstanding natural beauty of the west Kerry town that O’Connor has always been proud to call ‘home’.
While Children of the Shore opens the reader’s eyes to a vastly different Dingle to the one which thousands of visitors encounter these days, it does not obscure the ethereal beauty of the place and the vital importance of being among good people in challenging times.
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Children of the Shore will be on the shelves in Dingle book outlets on Dec. 2020.
Children of the Shore also available from Amazon books as an Ebook and paperback.
See dedicated website on writings: garraipublications.net
jackbren.net 