Parallel Lives is intriguing - a ghost story and a love story - but the background to this book is a story in itself.

Initially we are transported to Co Sligo and the small market town of Dunsilaney in 1740. We arrive in the Benbulbin estate owned by the rich Englishman of means, Sir Maurice Ilbert, who lives in the grand mansion looking towards the sweeping valley and the majestic Benbulbin Mountain.

One feature on the estate is more than special: the Mound of Dubhthach, a sacred place where the bones of noble ancestors lie. When rumours surface that the Mound is to be desecrated and graves dug up to allow new burials after a bitter winter of death and destruction, something has to be done to stop Ilbert and his henchmen fulfil their plans and cause such a tragedy.

Lead by Shamey O’Halloran, a fierce group of local people confront the landowner’s gang and, under a silver moon on a bitterly cold snowy night a brutal and bloody fight breaks out. Ilbert’s insensitive overseer, northerner Thomas Burke, spits a truth when he shouts: “When Ulstermen meet Irishmen there’s always a war.”

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