The day after Britain declared war on Germany, the people of Ireland were dealing with the ‘blackout’ ie, after dark, minimising the amount of light that could be seen from houses, businesses and traffic in order to conceal it from warplanes that might be flying overhead.

The following is an excerpt from Love Will Have Its Way, where the main character, Violet, experiences the Waterford blackout first hand when she goes for a walk near her grandparents house in the city centre:

‘The people of Waterford were definitely respecting the blackout. Not a light was to be seen anywhere….She kept to the right side of the path, as was requested in the local papers. But not everyone was obeying this rule. Another shadow met her as she approached one of the public houses on John Street. It was more of a stumbling, singing shadow, walking in the middle of the road, obviously quite drunk. Violet felt the dark form sway towards her as she passed on the quiet street. Then it faded away as quickly as it had appeared.’

Buy my book on Amazon here: https://bit.ly/LoveWillHaveItsWay

Unknown's avatar

Published by Joyce

I am a 49 year old working mother from Waterford, Ireland. I have been writing in my spare time for the last fourteen years. I have currently completed the second draft of my second historical fiction novel. Most recently, my poem ‘From a Register of Sick Calls - attended to by the Clergy in July and August, 1922 during the Siege of Waterford’ was accepted by Poetry as Commemoration for their Dublin City Centre Poetry Jukebox, which was installed in the grounds of the Irish Museum of Modern Art on 1st November 2023. This poem was written during the Poetry as Commemoration workshops held in Waterford City Library in November, 2022. My poem, ‘Ballybricken Hill’, was published in Déise Voices: New Poems from County Waterford in 2019. I’ve also had two poems, ‘All Earth’ and ‘My Own Sakura’, published by Singapore Eco Journal, The Tiger Moth Review. Two short stories were shortlisted for the Atlantis Short Story Contest, “The Lone Wolf” in 2015 and “Spring Rain is a Different Entity” in 2017. The latter was also published in their inaugural anthology in 2018. My short story, “Ghosts” was longlisted for Wordsmiths, 2020. My short story, “Make Believe”, was published by The Galway Review in January 2021. I have had several articles on writing and writers published in The Irish Times, both online and in the Irish Times Magazine.

Leave a comment