Michael Sweeney

Michael Sweeney: Based on a True Story of Love and LossWhat if researching your family history uncovered a story that was too extraordinary to remain forgotten?When Dennis Cronin began researching his Irish ancestry, he wasn't looking for a novel. He was looking for his ancestors.What he discovered was the life of his great-grandfather, Michael Sweeney, a man born in nineteenth-century Ireland whose ordinary life was repeatedly swept into extraordinary events.From a small hill farm in the west of Ireland, Michael's life unfolds against a country undergoing profound and often painful change. Family, faith, poverty, emigration, war and political conflict shape the lives of those around him.Then tragedy strikes close to home.The death of Michael's daughter, Kate, becomes one of the most haunting episodes in a family history that had almost been forgotten. Years later, while researching his ancestors, Dennis discovered an old newspaper account of the inquest into her death. That discovery became the catalyst for this novel.Michael's story takes him through decades of Irish history, from the nineteenth century into the turbulent years of the Great War and the struggle for Irish independence.But this is not simply a story about historical events.It is the story of one ordinary man caught in the ambitions, prejudices and conflicts of others-and of the family he tries to protect from a world that repeatedly takes from him.There is injustice and loss, but also humour, warmth, love and resilience.Inspired by the author's own family history, Michael Sweeney brings together the intimacy of a family saga with the sweep of Irish historical fiction.If you enjoy Irish historical fiction, family sagas, genealogy, stories based on real people, or novels about Ireland's turbulent past, discover the story of Michael Sweeney.Some family stories are lost.Some are forgotten.And some wait generations to be told.