I always have different projects at different stages of development. I'm currently at the earliest possible stage of the final part of my Irish trilogy, In The Hour.

Here's all I know so far and I'll keep you posted as more unfolds.

SETTING: Like the first two books in the trilogy (each of which can be read as a standalone novel) it is set in San Francisco, California and Wexford, Ireland. It is now 2010 and Jo Devereux is a single mother, living with her son Richard, the baby who was born at the end of Before The Fall.

MORE FAMILY SECRETS AND DENIAL: Richard (“Don't call me Ritchie!”) Devereux has a secret, which Jo knows about but they never discuss.

TEEN MAYHEM: That–and Jo's enduring loneliness–aside they have been as happy as a mother and son can be. But now, as Richard enters his teens, life is growing fraught.

He wants to break free and become his own person and Jo is brought to some reasisations about her own coming of age.

This sends her back to find out more about her mother (could she finally, at 55, be ready to understand more and resent less?) and her father (why had she never cared about his side of the family?).

Jo finds that scouring through family history is a process greatly helped by the Internet. No need to travel to Ireland now as she did when she needed to know more about her family history back in 1995.

But then, the piece of Ireland that she was most attached to–Rory O'Donovan, who else?–turns up on her doorstep.

With a suitcase.

And a teenage daughter to whom Richard is instantly attracted. And Jo's carefully constructed life begins to fall apart.

More soon!

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