Maeve Friel

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It was with utter sadness that yesterday I learned of the death of Maeve Friel. Maeve was an incredible, no, utterly extraordinary woman and I was extremely blessed and privileged to, not only have access to her wonderful catalog of childrens' books, but to know her personally.
Maeve was born in Derry, and was went to University in Dublin. She had lived in many, many places...including a small village in the middle of nowhere in Spain, which became the inspiration for the setting of the marvelous, adventurous Tiger Lily books. (And I was always pretty certain that the inspiration for Tiger Lily was the author herself.) Always generous with her time, energy, knowledge and humour, Maeve lit up the life of every child she met.
She wrote 18 books for children of various ages and many short stories, including the afore-mentioned Tiger Lily books (my personal favourites), the Witch-In-Training series and the moving, exquisite Lantern Moon, for which she won the Bisto Merit Award for 1996/1997 cycle.
Maeve, you will be sorely missed by your friends and colleagues...and all those whose lives you touched. Thinking of your beautiful family at this time. RIP, dear lady.


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