Irish Biography

Talk Learn Connect is a collection of nearly forty interviews. Yvonne asked each guest five unique questions and curated their answers with a very conversational style. Featuring a mix of human stories, some more poignant than others, there is a common thread of authenticity and relatability running throughout.

Approximately 100,000 single mothers lost their babies to forced separation in Ireland since independence in 1922. 35,000 pregnant, single women were sent to nine Mother and Baby Homes, where thousands of their babies and young children died due to wilful neglect and indifference.

This is a tale of great self-honesty and courage and will be of great interest to anyone facing great challenges in their life.

Sheds light not only on Helena Molony but on the many causes and characters she worked with during her long public career working as an Abbey Theatre actor, fighting in the 1916 Easter Rising, and as a leading trade unionist.

Tomi Reichental, who lost 35 members of his family in the Holocaust and was the subject of the documentary "Till The Tenth Generation", gives his account of being imprisoned as a child at Belsen concentration camp.

Paddy Reid spent thirty years working in some of the poorest communities in the United States – mainly in the Deep South – as a handyman, prison visitor and outreach worker. In The River Healer, he recounts his encounters with some of the remarkable people he met along the way – and their resilience in the face of grinding poverty.

The heartbreaking and inspiring account of a young girl who suffered horrifically at the hands of nuns in the Nazareth House Convent.

Patrick 'Paddy' Reilly is one of Ireland's most famous balladeers, best known for his renditions of "The Fields of Athenry", "Rose of Allendale" and "The Town I Loved So Well". Paddy shares his memories of nearly 60 years as a solo performer, as well as his nine years with The Dubliners.

Albert Reynolds has led an extraordinary life. In this book, Ireland's eighth Taoiseach tells his life story - from his childhood and first steps as a young businessman to his action-filled years in the political arena.

The Reynolds family is Meath GAA royalty.

IRELAND'S FORGOTTEN LEGACY In 1914-1918, two hundred thousand Irishmen from all religions and backgrounds went to war. At least thirty-five thousand never came home. An award-winning collection of veterans' stories as told by the families, with military records, surviving documents and letters.

John Schwatschke was born in Dublin 1943 to Austro-Irish parents. Known as a Carlow portrait painter due to his family home being there since his father’s arrival in 1926.After secondary school at The King’s Hospital, the artist studied briefly at The National College of Art, Kildare Streetm Dublin (art and architecture) and as a draughtsman with a prominent Dublin architect. Also studied portraiture under Franz Erhmer in Munich. Originally interested in musical composition for pianoforte, his first art patron Pres. E. de Valera persuaded him to give up music for art: “Do one thing and do it well, and I believe that should be art”.