Hey Jason, thank you for taking the time to write such a detailed review and for engaging so thoughtfully with my work. I truly appreciate that you’ve read through the Stones Corner series and taken the trouble to analyse it in such depth.
You’re absolutely right that Turmoil, Darkness, and Light are not easy reads, nor were the times they portray. My aim in writing these books was never to glorify or justify any side of the conflict, but to try to show what life looked and felt like for ordinary people, caught between impossible choices, when the world around them fell apart.
As you know, I was born and raised in Derry, and like many from my generation, I grew up surrounded by fear, loss, courage, humour, and contradictions. Those contradictions are what I try to capture, how someone can hold compassion in one hand and anger in the other; how love and loyalty can coexist with politics and pain.
Your points about political balance are noted. The series was written from the ground up through the eyes of factory workers, mothers, soldiers, priests, and children — rather than from a political lens. There are many sides to every story, and every reader will see different truths depending on their experience. That’s what makes this history, and this place, so complex and so human.
If anything, what I hope readers take away is empathy, for everyone who lived through those years, whatever side of the fence they were on. None of us came out untouched, and no single book could ever capture it all.
Thank you again for reading, for caring enough to respond, and for reminding me why telling these stories matters, because the conversations they spark are part of the healing that still needs to happen. JB
You’re absolutely right that Turmoil, Darkness, and Light are not easy reads, nor were the times they portray. My aim in writing these books was never to glorify or justify any side of the conflict, but to try to show what life looked and felt like for ordinary people, caught between impossible choices, when the world around them fell apart.
As you know, I was born and raised in Derry, and like many from my generation, I grew up surrounded by fear, loss, courage, humour, and contradictions. Those contradictions are what I try to capture, how someone can hold compassion in one hand and anger in the other; how love and loyalty can coexist with politics and pain.
Your points about political balance are noted. The series was written from the ground up through the eyes of factory workers, mothers, soldiers, priests, and children — rather than from a political lens. There are many sides to every story, and every reader will see different truths depending on their experience. That’s what makes this history, and this place, so complex and so human.
If anything, what I hope readers take away is empathy, for everyone who lived through those years, whatever side of the fence they were on. None of us came out untouched, and no single book could ever capture it all.
Thank you again for reading, for caring enough to respond, and for reminding me why telling these stories matters, because the conversations they spark are part of the healing that still needs to happen. JB