Seanchai

"My name is Brigid O'Sullivan... I don't know my own beginnings. Whoever left me on the doorstep of the convent pinned this note to me: "This baby is named Brigid." Nothing else. The name is what's important to me...." So begins the story of an innocent girl on the threshhold of womanhood. She will journey through a great darkness before she learns the truth of her identity. Working in the convent garden, Brigid O'Sullivan senses voices speaking from under the ancient Irish soil. Slowly, they become clearer and stronger, no longer outside her but speaking within her own blood-each one needing to tell its own strand of an intriguing tale. What is the secret they are trying to reveal? To conceal her connection with the voices, which the sisters forbid, Brigid devises a code and weaves the story that is coming to her into the knot-work she must create to help earn her keep. Seanchai (the Storyteller) weaves a complex tale-of love and tragedy, magic and powers beyond the human imagination, the sweetness of young romance and a terror unleashed by lust. And of forgiveness and redemption.

Penelope Ann Thoms is an international-award-winning poet and short story writer and a playwright. Before becoming a board certified chaplain and spiritual director, she worked in publishing and journalism in New York and San Francisco. She and her husband, Steve, live with Rosie, their border collie, overlooking the beautiful Cloonee lakes in the Tuosist area of Kenmare, Co. Kerry.