Sheelagh Kelly – författare

An epic saga of romance and adventure set in turn-of-the-century York up to and including the First World War. Sheelagh Kelly is the well known author of the Feeney Saga, as well as being a regular entrant on the Guardian Top 100 Bestseller list. Shoddy Prince is the first volume in a major new series.

The second volume of bestselling saga author Sheelagh Kelly’s new Yorkshire trilogy.Like his favourite Aunt Kit, Probyn Kilmaster wants more out of life than to follow his father down the pit. The youngest of seven children, six of them girls, Probyn is sick of being ordered around. He has always admired Aunt Kit’s disregard for convention and, using her as inspiration, runs away to join the army, thus alienating himself from the rest of his family. On his first foreign posting he becomes involved with a woman much older than himself who persuades him to go through an unofficial wedding ceremony. But when, like his sisters, his ‘wife’ starts to boss him around, Probyn searches for escape. Narrowly avoiding court martial, he is sent back to England seeking to rectify his mistakes and make peace with his family.When he falls in love and marries a young inexperienced woman, Agnes, his family are horrified – she is a Catholic unlike themselves. But Probyn stands by his decision and finds success in his work and domestic life – until the ‘wife’ from his youth turns up on the doorstep one day, and his world is thrown into turmoil.

Sheelagh Kelly’s famous first novel is also the first volume of her bestselling ‘Feeney’ saga.One fateful morning in August 1846, Patrick Feeney surveyed his ruined potato crop – and for the first time knew despair.With a delicate wife and their unborn child, he had no choice but to leave that wild and beautiful corner of Ireland and set out for England in search of work. But from the moment Patrick and Mary set foot in Liverpool, they are beset by new trials. After tramping the long, weary miles to York, they are forced to settle in the nightmarish slums of Walmgate, where disease and death are rife. Yet the very poverty and hopelessness of their surroundings bind the small community together in a stubborn determination to survive through tragedy and win for themselves a better life.Peopled with rich and colourful characters, here is a marvellously fresh, unpredictable saga full of passion, struggle and humour.

The third novel in Sheelagh Kelly’s bestselling ‘Feeney’ saga is now reissued as a HarperCollins Paperback.By the year 1875, the Feeneys have left the squalor of the slums far behind them, yet the spectre of tragedy still stalks their path. Patrick remains the simple man of simple tastes, out of sympathy with Thomasin’s ambition to expand her business empire still further across Yorkshire’s broad acres. They have already lost a son to a fiery death, when their granddaughter Rosanne follows a rebel lover down a star-crossed road. Now they must look to their other grandchildren – Nick, a cool young man who’s privy to everone’s secrets, and Erin’s daughter Belle, who has problems of her own – to fill the wide chasm of sadness… When the clouds crack open with a shaft of sunlit hope, Patrick Feeney has come full circle, home to the hills of Ireland half a century on.

A stunning saga set in the city of York, as a poor boy falls for a rich girl – a tale of passion, poverty, and ultimately great bravery as they fight to keep together against everyone’s expectations.Marty Lanegan is working as a boot boy in York’s splendid Station Hotel when he catches sight of the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen. Henrietta Ibbetson is the daughter of a prominent landowner, who’s far from pleased with his rebellious daughter. When she announces her love for a mere servant, he throws her out.Marty’s family is none too delighted with his choice – Etta can’t cook, sew, clean or make herself useful in any way. However, Marty is ambitious, Etta is content and they are wildly in love. But is that enough to sustain them as they raise a family of their own?Sheelagh Kelly is back with a tremendously compelling saga of life below the poverty line in her home town of York, as the rigid conventions of Edwardian England crumble in the onslaught of the Great War – and her characters face the changes with warmth, humour and determination.

A tale of sorrow and joy, and passion against seemingly insurmountable odds, Sheelagh Kelly is back with this saga set in the beautiful town of York.Niall may be poor but he is a good man. He does his best for his wife and their five children, in difficult circumstances in their small, cramped house in the back streets of York. But this loving home is torn apart when his wife dies in a tragic accident and Niall finds himself alone with only his mother-in-law and sisters-in-law for company. His five children run him ragged and, seeking solace, he finds refuge at the Angel pub.Here he catches sight of Boudicea, the Angel's beautiful and bubbly barmaid. With his wife only gone a few months, he must supress his feelings of passion, yet he finds he’s unable to tear himself away from her warm charm and alluring looks.But Niall's mother-in-law, the aptly named Mrs Beasty, is determined to do all she can to keep Niall from finding happiness again. And when she discovers that Boudicea's past is far from perfect, she conspires to bring about her downfall…

A dramatic saga that sweeps from the dust of the Boer War to the carnage of the Great War, with a bitter private conflict sandwiched in between…Corporal Russ Hazelwood loves his wife Rachel, but she is far away, and the African woman seems the answer to long, passionless nights on the veldt. The war over, Russ returns to York and Rachel, to a growing family and increasing prosperity, little realizing how – years later – those moments of weakness in Africa will come back to haunt him, threatening to destroy everything he cherishes.Then, overshadowing all, comes the most dreadful war the world has ever seen. And when it is over, the greatest battle has still to be won – on the home front.

The second title in Sheelagh Kelly’s bestselling ‘Feeney’ saga tells how one treacherous act can turn a brother’s love into a murderous rage…In the summer of 1867 a sudden change in the fortunes of the Feeney family saves them from their life of struggle and poverty in the mean back streets of York. But what will save the Feeney family from itself? Patrick and Thomasin Feeney and their children, Erin, Richard and Sonny, each have different dreams – and as these dreams grow under the influence of their new-found wealth the old bonds between them begin to break. Estranging husband and wife, dividing father and son, setting brother against brother. But it is Richard, as dishonest and selfish as he is handsome and charming, whose final betrayal threatens to bring down the judgment of God.

The fourth and final title in Sheelagh Kelly’s bestselling ‘Feeney’ saga follows the story of Richard William Feeney – ‘Dickie’.Supposedly dying a hero’s death in a tragic fire in 1874, Richard Feeney secretly escaped the flames and fled to America, where he prospered. Now, twenty-six years later, he is back in York in the bosom of his astonished family.The year 1900 is about to fade… along with the life of Patrick Feeney, Dickie’s beloved father. Recriminations are temporarily forgotten, as the family reunites in grief. But the past has a way of catching up, and Dickie’s day of reckoning is just around the corner. His jaunty good looks and disregard for the law invariably land Dickie in trouble. Behind him lies a trail of chaos, and his long-suffering wife and family are burdened with the consequences. When Mr Rufforth of the Yorkshire Insurance Company recognizes Dickie as the son who supposedly died, he is faced with a trial and possible imprisonment. Meanwhile, Detective Chief Inspector Scholes Nettleton reopens his files on an unsolved double murder.