Alix ONeill - The Troubles With Us: One Belfast Girl on Boys, Bombs and Finding Her Way

One Belfast girl on boys, bombs and finding her way

4th Estate

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This eBook first published in Great Britain by 4th Estate in 2021

Copyright Alix ONeill 2021

Map Micky ONeill 2021

Alix ONeill asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work

Some names and other features have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals featured in this book

Quote from Mmmbop by Hanson: Words & Music by Isaac Hanson, Taylor Hanson & Zachary Hanson. Copyright 1997 Jam N Bread Music; All Rights Administered by Kobalt Music Publishing Limited; All Rights Reserved International Copyright Secured; Used by permission of Hal Leonard Europe Limited.

Cover design by Ola Galewicz

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins

Source ISBN: 9780008393748

Ebook Edition June 2021 ISBN: 9780008393724

Version: 2022-04-07

A Sunday Times Memoir of the Year

A SheerLuxe Memoir of the Year

Pacy, terrifyingly visual and mordantly funny, this endearing family portrait set against a backdrop of unflinching horror tells us more about Belfast and the world than any newspaper or academic tome Alix ONeills memoir is an absolute blast of a book that reminds us how to be human

June Caldwell, author of Little Town Moone

Funnier than Derry Girls, this Belfast girl will have you laughing on every page of this evocative and revealing Troubles memoir

Paul McVeigh, author of The Good Son

Full of wit and warmth, this brilliant memoir of resilience and humour is a total delight

Sunday Independent

The writing is full of energy and originality. One can only imagine what good company ONeill is in person this book is genuine and funny with insights into Northern Irelands evolution through the 1980s and 1990s into something like peace

Sinad OShea, Irish Times

A charming book, by turns caustic and funny, innocent and canny

Craig Brown, The Mail on Sunday

ONeill has produced a literary equivalent of Derry Girls

Charlie Connelly, The New European

This is a brassy, ballsy, belter of a book full of the real grit of what it means to come from Northern Ireland this book will turn your views on the Troubles upside down. ONeill writes the North like no one else I have encountered; with wit, humour and pure affection

Kerri n Dochartaigh, author of Thin Places

This book is one of the most compelling and moving Ive read in years and I want to grab passers-by to tell them about it. Its eye-wateringly funny, clever, insightful, emotional all things you could want from a memoir

Lucy Vine, author of Are We Nearly There Yet?

A sharp and very funny coming of age memoir an enlightening read

Business Post

For Daddy D

Hold on to the ones who really care, in the end theyll be the only ones there

Hanson

My family

Mummy(Anne)

Daddy(Micky)

Toni, my sister

Mummys ones

Daddy Devlin (also known as Jimmy if youre talking to a Protestant or Pat for the Catholics in the room), Mummys daddy

Mummy Devlin(Mary), Mummys mummy

Gogi(Tony), Mummys brother. The eldest in the family

John, Mummys youngest brother

Gerry, Mummys middle brother

Hil, Mummys middle sister

Bernie, Mummys youngest sister

Liz, Johns wife

Brendan, Hils husband

Daddys ones

Grandma (also Mary), Daddys mummy

Papa, Daddys daddy

Roseleen, Grandmas sister

Lily, Grandmas sister

Jacqueline, Daddys sister

Teresa, Daddys sister

Ted, Daddys brother

David, Jacquelines husband

The Girls

Nat

Mel

Niamh

Jennifer

St Dominics classmates

Aisling

Colleen

Kelly

Pauline

Boys

Anto, First kiss

Laurie, Teenage obsession

Ryan, Flame-haired dream lover

Yer Man Jamie, Ryans friend

Sammy, Jennifers boyfriend

Johnny, Niamhs boyfriend

Dan, University crush

Mr G, Kind of a big deal

The Half-Bloods

Maggie

Liam

Kevin

Erin

Nora

The rest of em

Moira, Mummys best friend

Saoirse, Moiras daughter

Big Sean, Daddys best friend

Angela, Gogis girlfriend

Greig, Daddys friend

Laura, Family friend

Danielle, Best friend at primary school

Podge, Homeless man living at the bottom of our garden

Jimmy, Bouncer at the Cres

This is a work of creative non-fiction. All the events and people in this story are real, portrayed to the best of my mothers memory and mine. Occasionally, the chronology has been changed, some conversations have been recreated and/or supplemented and I have made two people into one. Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of certain individuals (and to avoid my knees being capped).

It started with Santa. That was the first whopper in our family. The first I knew about anyway. Most parents have the courtesy to deal their children this devastating blow before they hit adolescence. Or they assume theyll figure it out for themselves.

I was never the kind of kid who figured stuff out.

Mummy should have realised this the day I came home from school, aged nine, and asked whether we were Catholics or Protestants. After five years of being educated by nuns in Belfast, a city where walls were literally built to separate the two.

Still, I have to hand it to the woman, she knew how to do Christmas. On 10 December every year, the day after my sister Tonis birthday, out would come bowls of cinnamon-scented acorns, felt mice dressed as choristers and a hand-knitted tableau of snowmen representing each member of the family. Daddys been on at her for years to remove his snowmans earring, a painful reminder of his Bono phase.