Anne Doughty: 15 books

Will love be enough to overcome the odds? It is 1960 and Clare Hamilton is returning home to her beloved Armagh to marry Andrew, her childhood sweetheart. Full of the hope and possibilities of a newlywed couple, they plan to turn Andrew’s ancestral home into a guesthouse. Their ambition is to use...

‘An engaging story of opportunities lost and refound’ Express Can love help her through the most difficult decisions? When Jenny McKinstry is offered a new post as the Head of English at her Belfast school she’s elated! Yet she can’t help but feel conflicted about the position. With all those...

‘An immensely readable, summer holiday of a book’ Belfast Telegraph When Elizabeth Stewart, the only daughter of Protestant parents, announced that she wants to leave Belfast for the west coast of Ireland, her family can’t help but question her judgement. What could she possibly find in leafy...

Can she unlock the secrets of her past? Deirdre Weston, a London journalist, returns to her family home in Armagh to come to terms with the death of her mother. Faced with painful memories of her own past, Deirdre despairs of the task she has set herself. In her deepest need she encounters Deara,...

The hardest times can build the strongest friendships County Donegal, Ireland, April 1845. Since following her heart and moving from her comfortable home in Scotland to the harsh mountainside of Ardtur, County Donegal, Hannah McGinley hasn’t had the easiest life. But surrounded by her two children...

Little Rose McGinley is just seven years old when her family is evicted from their Donegal home, victims of the Clearances of 1861. It is the first step in a long journey for Rose, one that takes her from Donegal to Kerry, and back again to the North. But the feisty girl blossoms into a woman of character with courage and the determination to keep her family together, against all the odds.

Now a grandmother, Rose Hamilton has much to be thankful for in the steady love of her husband John and their relative prosperity. But she is concerned for her children: recently widowed, Sarah is burdened with grief; Sam, married to the cold Martha, is struggling to keep up with his large family. But it is the Easter Rising of 1916 that will make the greatest demand upon them all.

‘Engaging characters, poignant plots’ ELIZABETH GILL County Armagh, 1845. Married to the local blacksmith, young Sarah Hamilton spends her days looking after John and his apprentices at the forge, and her happiness is strengthened by the steady love of her husband and the beautiful landscape...

At the close of the nineteenth century the Hamilton family is enjoying new-found security and modest prosperity. John is a respected employee at the local mill and Rose’s four children are growing into young men and women of whom she can feel justly proud. But as she watches them make their own...

At nearly sixteen, Rosie Hamilton of Liskeyborough, is growing into a lovely young woman. With only another week to go at Miss Wilson’s school in Richhill, she is concerned and preoccupied with what her future might hold. Rosie has always had to contend with her mother’s fierce and unpredictable...

Salter’s Grange, County Armagh, 1932. For Sam Hamilton and Robert Scott, the world has changed greatly since the days when they played together outside their fathers' forge. Now in their fifties, with families of their own, they are grateful to have work at a time of mass-unemployment and little...

It is 1942 and, although outside the bombing area of German planes, the quiet countryside of County Down is far from peaceful. The textile mills around Banbridge are running on twenty-four hour shifts and Alex Hamilton is struggling to keep overworked machinery going while pressure is rising for fabric,...

Little Clare Hamilton is just nine years old when her childhood abruptly ends with the sudden death of both her parents in a typhoid epidemic. While her kind Aunt Polly takes her in, Clare longs to leave the cramped house in Belfast and return to the country. So she seizes the opportunity to return...

The summer of 1957 is the happiest of times for Clare Hamilton, despite a recent loss. She will shortly embark on her final year at Queen’s University, Belfast, and she is engaged to marry her childhood sweetheart, Andrew. Together they plan for a future which will take them far beyond the green...