Story from The Troubles in Derry inspires Muff-based writer’s second novel

Muff-based writer Irene Melaugh has released her second novel, inspired by a true story from her native Derry.

From the Brandywell area of Derry, she began work in the Star shirt factory after leaving school early.

At 18 Irene married and moved to America and had four children. While there she began writing poetry, some of which was published. She also had a few articles about the Troubles published in the University of Buffalo.

She returned to Ireland after seven years and when her family was older, returned to adult education.

She became a lecturer in the North West Regional College in Derry and on the Open College Network and was commissioned to write some short comedy plays on mental health, bullying and addiction.

Around this time she joined an all women, comedy drama group called Stretch Marks Unlimited.

The group performed for a few years, mostly in Derry but occasionally in Donegal and Dublin. She tried her hand at writing a stage play. The result, My Da’s Suit, was staged at the Playhouse in Derry, receiving critical acclaim.

Her new novel shares the same name as her first stage play.

Irene describes the book as “two halves of a true story put together to make a nearly true story”.

“One day a friend of mine told me the story about her mother pawning her father’s suit every week to help her make ends meet. Her friend’s father never knew his suit spent most of every week in the pawn shop. He was a very proud man and would have been mortified to think his good suit was shuffled back and forth between his home in Creggan and Tommy Bar’s pawn in Bishop Street.”

READ NEXT: Carndonagh’s sporting story set to take centre stage

During The Troubles, the shop where the suit had been pawned was blown up. Her friend’s mother was worried about telling her husband about the suit.

Luckily she was able to get another identical suit for her husband. It was only later that week when he went to put the suit on to go to Mass did he realise that it was two sizes too small. His wife convinced him that it shrunk in the dry cleaners.

Irene’s inspiration for the book was her father, who was a tailor.

“He always made himself very unique, one-off suits. I wondered what would have happened if his suit, which could never be replaced, had been blown up in the pawn shop. That was the inspiration for the book, and so the story of My Da’s Suit was born”.

The book is available on Amazon, alongside Irene’s debut novel A Riot in Murphy’s Pub. She is working on a third novel, which is due to be released later this year, and its sequel.