Clonmel author was inspired by the advocacy of her late mother to write her second novel
Second novel Cygnet River, has just been published in New Zealand
A Clonmel author has written a new novel that is receiving a lot of media attention in New Zealand, where she lives with her family.
Sharron Martin (Gill), who has fond memories of growing up in Clonmel, now lives in Auckland with her husband, her three children, and a menagerie of animals.
Her first novel, Discovering Orla, was published in 2023, and her second novel, Cygnet River, has just been published in New Zealand.
Sharron, a daughter of Sam and the late Ann Gill, is excited about her new novel, a story of love, resilience, and the deserted wife Kitty Devlins' fight to reclaim her life. It is set in Ireland in 1975 at the height of The Troubles.
Sharron said that the inspiration for the book came from her late mother, who always drove home the message to her and her sister, the need for women to be independent.
“Growing up in the Republic of Ireland in the seventies, I was well aware of the general power imbalance between men and women. My own mother was particularly vocal about inequality, and while she insisted on having access to the family finances and car, she was in the minority for the time.
I learned about Deserted Wives from her outrage at the treatment of these women. The Deserted Wives entitlement started in 1970. From then on, women whose husbands had left them were branded with this unfortunate title, which carried a heavy social stigma, and many were virtually ostracised by their communities.
Forced to make embarrassingly public weekly trips to their local post office to collect their Deserted Wives Allowance, it was often their only source of income and never enough to support themselves and their families.
There was no way out either, because in the eyes of the Catholic Church, they were still married, and there was no divorce in Ireland until 1997. The ugly limbo of this situation struck me as horribly unjust, and I knew one day I would write about it. While Kitty’s story is fictional, there were many women for whom this was a reality. I wrote this book for them,” said Sharron.
Sharron, who was a student at the Loreto in Clonmel and appeared in a number of shows with St Mary’s Choral Society, said a teacher at the Loreto always encouraged her.
“At the Loreto, I wasn't interested in school at all, but I did have a wonderful English teacher, Mrs Kennedy, and she always loved my writing and encouraged me to keep it up. I think she would be chuffed to bits to know that I have a couple of books under my belt now,” said Sharron.
She had a love of horses at an early age and has fond memories of helping out with the horses at Duffy’s and Leo Swifts in Clonmel, as well as being part of the Pony Club at the Racecourse.
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After her school days in Clonmel, Sharron went to live and work in London for a while, and from there she decided to head off to travel around New Zealand.
Thirty years later, Sharron is still in New Zealand and enjoying life with her family.
“Before Covid, I used to go home to Clonmel every couple of years,” said Sharron, whose mother Ann died during Covid.
“She was a fierce advocate for women and was a strong voice for women in Clonmel, and was very involved in community efforts to bring women together so that they could support one another. All she did in Clonmel showed how much she was ahead of her time. The issues she was concerned with are as relevant today as they ever were. She was a big influence on me,” said Sharron.
Sharron said she is delighted with how much attention the book was getting.
“I have signed an agreement with a distributor so that it will be in all of the shops in New Zealand and I am going on national radio on June 3rd to speak about it. I am staggered by it all really,” said Sharron.