Heartfelt and deeply moving account of the modern-day scourge of cyberbullying
Over the past 12 years, Sinead Moriarty has been tackling uncomfortable and painful subjects and weaving them into compelling, thought-provoking stories. Whether it is infertility problems, anorexia, or euthanasia, Moriarty (below) treats her topics with sensitivity, but also with warmth and a sense of humour, which has led to her becoming a best-selling author.
Her 13th novel, Our Secrets and Lies, deals with a relatively new issue which is horrifying parents and causing endless anguish for children — the problem of cyberbullying.
Life is good for Lucy Murphy. At 21, she is an A-student in her third year studying law with a bright future and a boyfriend, Tom.
Her working-class parents couldn’t be more proud.
But her dreams are shattered when she finds she is pregnant with twins.
Lucy is accused of being a slut and a gold-digger by Tom’s rich father, Gabriel, who sends Tom away. Humiliated, Lucy is determined that her twins, Dylan and Kelly, will be successful and get to have the wonderful life that she has been denied.
Seventeen years later and still driven by Gabriel’s disdain all those years ago, single mum Lucy is thrilled when her twins earn scholarships to Tom’s old private school for their final two school years.
While Dylan settles in, gets a girlfriend and becomes a popular football player, Kelly is bullied. But Lucy, having had her own ambitions thwarted, is so caught up in her children’s successful futures, she is not aware of what they really want.
Kelly is miserable and the bullying is relentless. It continues after school, with online taunts and harassment.
On top of that, Lucy is so afraid of another unplanned pregnancy that she bans Kelly from seeing her lovely boyfriend, Sean.
It is not until the unthinkable happens that Lucy, with support from friends and family, realises what is really important in life before it is too late.
Displaying her usual brilliance and understanding of family dynamics, Moriarty documents the sheer horror of cyberbullying — the insidious daily drain on a child’s confidence, the feelings of worthlessness and the inability to tell parents, or teachers, what is happening.
Our Secrets and Lies is heartfelt and deeply moving, but also so gripping that it is almost impossible to put down.