Limerick Author Deirdre McCarthy Returns Home

Pictured above (L-R) Limerick Author, Deirdre McCarthy and Limerick Artist Jim O’Farrell. Limerick Author Deirdre McCarthy returns home.

Last week Limerick Author Deirdre McCarthy returns home for her brother, Donal Mulcahy’s birthday from upstate NY.  While that event was extraordinary and exciting in itself there was something else she had to do, and that was to meet up finally with Limerick artist, Jim O’Farrell, to present to him a finished copy of the book they both have been working on for the past five years. Limerick Author returns home.

Pictured above is Nancy Blakes pub, Limerick where Deirdre lived above throughout her childhood.

Deirdre, who is a storyteller and presenter of Irish Culture in the NY area, wrote a story poem called “The Rescue of Fairy Queen Maeve” and she wanted to find someone back home in Ireland to be her illustrator. That’s where the well-known and respected Limerick artist, Jim O’Farrell, comes into the story.  She found him online and he agreed to work with her. Jim spends several months a year in India as a working artist where he also conducts art workshops in local schools. While there, he also teaches street children to paint with water colours, which he says is his greatest pleasure. Between all his trips to India he found the time to work on the drawings.

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Billy Hayes, local Limerick artist, contributed also, by photographing the illustrations and sending them along via email.  It was a labour of love and Deirdre is thrilled how it turned out. Tami Shutt, a friend back in the US helped her with the layout.

Limerick Author Deirdre McCarthy has been living in New York State for 30 years and for all of those years she has never lost her connection to home.  She enjoys teaching conversational Irish language to adults at area colleges. She also has been teaching non-competitive Irish dance in the Central Square Central School District for the past fifteen years.  She is an active member with the Syracuse Irish Session and presents her Imaginary Trip to Ireland cultural program to schools, libraries and many Irish festivals throughout NY. Limerick Author returns home.

She also loves performing with her family, “The McCarthy Family Singers”.  One venue they love to perform at is the New York State Fair where they have been singing for the past eleven years.  They perform at many local nursing homes and had the distinct pleasure of meeting and singing for Kathleen Hayes Snavely, born in Feakle, Co Clare, and who became the oldest living Irish person in history. She died at the ripe old age of 113. When she passed away The McCarthy Family sang at her funeral.

Deirdre loves her Irish culture and everywhere she goes she tells everyone about the great city of Limerick.  She sincerely hopes to come back to Limerick in the near future to have a book launch.

To find out more about Deirdre McCarthy click here

Check out the McCarthy Family here

Read more about Limerick Artist Jim O’Farrell here