Maeve Kelly, an Irish novelist, short-story writer and poet, was born in Ennis, Co. Clare and educated in Dundalk. She was a founding member of the limerick Federation of Women’s Organisations and the Limerick Refuge for Battered Wives, now called Adapt House, where she was an administrator for fifteen years. In 1972 she won the Hennessy literary award.
She is the author of two short story collections, A Life of Her Own (1976) and Orange Horses (1990), a satirical fairytale, Alice in Thunderland (1993), two novels, Necessary Treasons (1985) and Florrie’s Girls (1989), and two collections of poetry, Resolution (1986) and Lament for Oona (2005). Kelly’s work has been translated into several european languages and has been broadcast on RTÉ and BBC. Kelly’s A Last Loving: Collected Poems (2016) was recently published by the Irish press Arlen House.