Omagh author releases new fictional publication

THE award-winning journalist who broke the story of the Hanrahan farm controversy in Co Tipperary in the 1970s has just published a new fascinating fictional book, ‘The Seventh Man and Other Stories’.

The work, penned by John Devine, who is a native of Omagh, features 13 stories, including, of course, the eponymous ‘The Seventh Man’ which tells the tale of a man named in a newspaper as one of seven men killed in the SAS ambush of an IRA brigade. The named man didn’t die… because he wasn’t there.

Another such story, ‘Confirmation Day’, boasts a hilarious cast of people assembled by chance who experience a day they will never forget.

Meanwhile, ‘The Mission’ has hell’s fire, brimstone, death and holy purity in abundance – but there is an undercurrent innocently trying to clarify where exactly women stand in the Catholic church.

‘The Black Babies’ is more than about gathering money for foreign missions and touches on the fragility of human relationships from earliest days.

And ‘In Roddy Meets Old Mother Riley’, the recreational, often weekly, violence occurring on GAA pitches across Ireland, which officially never happens, is explored, and where the language is coarse.

While ‘Trudy’ is a tender story of teenage love across Northern Ireland’s divide and how it doesn’t exist if people are determined enough not to let it.

Award-winning author

John, who now lives in Bangor, was Northern Editor of the Irish Independent from 1985 to 2004, when he retired.

He covered the Troubles for many years, up to and including the Good Friday Agreement.

He was also chosen for the award for ‘Outstanding Work in Irish Journalism’ in 1981, an award presented to him by then Minister Desmond O’Malley.

A former industrial correspondent of the Independent, he later worked as a feature writer, investigative reporter, and columnist at the Sunday Independent, before being appointed to head up the Independent’s editorial operations in Northern Ireland. In the ‘New Year’s Honours List’ for 2004, he was awarded the OBE for his work in journalism, which was presented to him at Buckingham Palace by Queen Elizabeth II.

The story of the Hanrahan farm gripped the agricultural sector in the 1970s and 1980s.

The Merck Sharp and Dohme company opened a chemical plant near the Hanrahan farm at Carrick on Suir.

The firm’s arrival was widely-welcomed, but within two years John Hanrahan and his family were complaining of noxious odours.

The farmer sued the company but lost his case in the High Court in 1980. A Supreme Court appeal was then taken. He won his case there. The court said that among the likely sources of the pollution was ‘an incinerator for burning waste chemicals and solvents, which, for significant periods, was run at below its design temperature and at a heat inadequate to destroy the chemicals’.

The company expressed great disappointment with the result of the case, but reassured local people that it would not lead to the departure of the company from the area.

Mr Hanrahan then pursued a legal case for compensation; a claim held up for some years, as the company demanded that he must produce more documentation on the damage caused to his farm.

There are even more stories in ‘The Seventh Man’, so make sure to pick up your copy today!