“At certain times of the year, a 5 ft 3" woman with dark, curly hair can be seen pacing round a graveyard in West London speaking into a dictaphone, gesticulating occasionally and stopping from time to time — to peer at the gravestones”.

That dark curly haired woman, as her niece once described her above, is infamous Irish author and historian Ruth Dudley Edwards who will be taking part in this years Athlone Literary Festival. The critically acclaimed researcher and writer will be interviewed by Irish journalist Dave O’Connell on her award winning non-fiction and her quirkycrime fiction novels aswell as her political views. Commenting on the event Festival Committee Member Mel O’Flynn said “the interview with Ruth Dudley Edwards promises to be a stimulating and thought-provoking event and it’s a unique opportunity for the audience to engage with a writer and historian of such import.”

Ruth Dudley Edwards was born and brought up in Dublin and educated at University College Dublin, Girton College, Cambridge and Wolfson College, Cambridge. Her non-fiction books include An Atlas of Irish History, James Connolly, Victor Gollancz: A Biography (winner of the James Tait Black Memorial Prize), The Pursuit of Reason: The Economist 1843-1993, The Faithful Tribe: An Intimate Portrait of the Loyal Institutions (shortlisted for Channel 4/The House Politico’s Book of the Year) and Newspapermen: Hugh Cudlipp, Cecil King and the glory days of Fleet Street. Her Patrick Pearse: The Triumph of Failure (winner of the National University of Ireland Prize for Historical Research), first published in 1977, was reissued in 2006 by Irish Academic Press. In 2009 she published Aftermath: The Omagh Bombings and the Families' Pursuit of Justice a book about the civil case that was won on 8 June 2009 against the Omagh bombers. Also a crime fiction writer, her novels include: Corridors of Death, The Saint Valentine's Day Murders, The English School of Murder, Clubbed to Death, Matricide at St. Martha's, Ten Lords A-Leaping, Murder in a Cathedrals, Publish and Be Murdered, Anglo-Irish Murders, Carnage on the Committee, and Murdering Americans.

The interview with Ruth Dudley Edwards takes place at 4pm on Saturday 8th October in the Shamrock Lodge Hotel. The festival takes place October 7th, 8th and 9th. A full festival programme is available on www.athloneliteraryfestival.com and the Festival can also be found on Facebook and Twitter. To make a booking, please contact literaryathlone@gmail.com or phone/text 086 2282760.