An Undiscovered Country

About the Book

Initially the context of the story is the conflict in Ireland and in some ways the troubles of Lorna and her family reflect that situation. Lorna Donnelly is the eldest in a family of four children: Catholics living in a Loyalist region of Belfast. The story originates at the time of the first IRA ceasefire and culminates about the time of the Peace Accord some 37 years later. Mr. Donnelly is killed by the IRA and his wife decides to migrate with her children to England. She meets and marries Jimmy Ungerside a butcher. Jimmy is a serial child abuser and to varying degrees the whole family suffer at his hands, especially Lorna. The effect on the girl’s development and later on her career is seen as an echo in tandem of the ‘Troubles’. The same is also true of her sister and two brothers. Each chapter includes a contemporaneous news report and an excerpt from Lorna’s diary each linked by some similar notion of abuse. Lorna eventually marries but the episodes that torment her psychology continue despite concentrated periods of treatment. It is not until she is made aware of another significant cause that there is finally some hope of real recovery.

About the Author

Mike Cumiskey was raised in the north of England. His grandparents on both sides were immigrant families one side from Ireland and the other from Italy/Sicily. The creative life he enjoys besides his writing includes the visual arts and this is the area in which he was trained. He has taught and lectured extensively throughout the UK and his sculpture and drawings are represented in a variety of collections in Germany, France, England, the USA and Canada, including the national collection of Trinidad and Tobago. He was the first sculptor in the UK to be employed on staff with a new town development corporation where a number of his public works are still to be seen. In 1974 he was awarded the Ronald Tree Fellowship in sculpture to the University of the West Indies. He began writing whilst he was in the West Indies and since then has completed eight novels as well as a large variety of other works including poetry some of which has also been published. Currently he lives and works in Devon with his wife Sue their three children are now grown and have long-since left home.