Louise Kennedy, author of the acclaimed novel Trespasses, has revealed how a cancer diagnosis inspired her to write her first book. The novel, set during the Troubles in Belfast, was adapted into a hit TV series starring Gillian Anderson. Kennedy's new novel, Stations, draws on her own teenage years and explores themes of displacement and Irish emigration.
From Restaurant to Writing Group
Kennedy was a chef for 30 years, working in Dublin, London, and Beirut, before settling in Sligo. In 2014, while struggling to keep her restaurant afloat during Ireland's financial crisis, she was persuaded by a friend, visual artist Niamh Mac Cabe, to join a creative writing group led by writer Una Mannion. At the first meeting, she committed to writing a short story, and from that moment, she knew she wanted to keep writing.
Cancer Diagnosis Sparks Novel
Kennedy's writing life began to flourish, but then she was diagnosed with melanoma. The cancer had spread, requiring surgery and immunotherapy. Unable to work, she sat at her kitchen table and wrote 1,000 words a day. By the time she returned to work, she had 64,000 words. 'It wasn't really a novel. It was a pile of shite. But when I did actually go back to it, there was something on the page to fix,' she said.
New Novel Explores Emigration
Her new novel, Stations, follows two misfit teenagers, Róisín and Red, as they navigate teenage alienation and displacement in small-town Ireland and London. Kennedy herself left Northern Ireland in 1979 when her family moved to Naas, a move she hated. She says they left because there wasn't work, but also because 'it was a closed, judgmental, shithole theocracy that we were living in, and we wanted to get the hell away.'
Kennedy has endured complications from her cancer, including damage to her pituitary gland, but she is now on a more even keel. She is working on her next book, which will be set in the 1990s. Despite her success, she prefers writing to talking about it, and she has no plans to return to the kitchen professionally.
