In search of a state of grace

Maireád Whyte isn’t afraid to take a chance and embrace change. If she was, she wouldn’t have swapped life as a company director in the UK for that of a self-publishing writer with no previous connection to the world of literature.

Her decision to leave her career in maths, computing and engineering behind wasn’t hailed as a master move by those closest to Maireád. She stuck with her convictions though and hasn’t looked back.
“I was one of the company directors but I resigned from that because I wanted to pursue my own dreams. That brought a lot of chaos with it. My marriage broke down and I absolutely sold everything that I owned. Most people thought that it was a bit of a mad decision, having this lucrative job but what I wanted to do was go full time into writing,” Maireád explained.
These days she lives in Quilty having moved there about a month ago. Seeking solitude, Maireád found just that back West.
“I was living abroad for about 16 years and I had been living in England for about the last 10 years. I moved back to Ireland, strangely enough, in the height of the recession. I wanted to find somewhere in the West. I love the sea, cliff walks, walking and the wilderness. So I picked Clare. I wanted to live in either West Clare or South Galway because I love the energy in the area. I love the serenity. I love getting up in the morning and wondering what day it is. You kind of go into that sort of mode,” Maireád mused in a broad Cork accent. Life may have taken a few turns but her distinctive accent hasn’t diluted a scintilla.
“I was in Sweden and Switzerland for a few years, along with the last few years in England, and I’d say I never really shed my Cork accent,” she laughed.
Late last year, Maireád self-published her first book, All For Grace. Spanning across two centuries with two intertwining plot lines, the story told is one of discovery and intrigue as several relationships between past, present and future gradually unravel.
A novel that merges the ordinary with the extraordinary and the serious with the funny, All for Grace demonstrates through the many storyline twists, the “wonderful power of our souls, the essence of love and how we are the creators of our own fate”, is how the author describes the genesis of her first novel.
“When I started writing articles and short stories about five years ago, I never wrote anything with the intention of producing a book,” she reflected.
Much of the story’s background derives from Maireád’s upbringing in Ballycotton, a fishing village in Cork.
“In a nutshell, it’s initially set in the 20th century. It’s the story of the life and afterlife of a country man called Gerry Daly. It revolves around his life and his choices, a love affair, marriage and a family feud over land. His story is narrated two centuries later by twins travelling to birth from the womb. In essence, Gerry is reborn. It’s taken to that level where it removes the reader above the circumstance where the see the bigger picture,” Maireád explained.
“A lot of my experiences, from corporate and country life – I grew up on a farm – are in the book. To me, you write because you’ve something to say. A lot of my own experiences would be in there. Whether that be pain, sorrow or sadness. Equally, the laughter, the happiness, the achievements,” she said.
Maireád is confident the book contains an element of self-empowerment.
“It combines the ordinary with the extraordinary, the physical and the spiritual worlds and the serious with the funny. It is a relevant and unique self-empowerment novel and provides the reader with an entirely new view on spirituality and leaves them with an uplifted feeling,” she suggested.
“I am an ordinary person and I thoroughly believe that we all have a huge internal power to individually achieve more joy in our lives despite external circumstances and my passion is to inject that hope and to do my bit to help awaken others to a life with more joy, less prejudice and less judgement. Writing is my joy, it comes from my heart,” Maireád revealed.
She feels that taking chances and following her instinct is something she is glad she has had the courage to do.
“I’m constantly challenging myself. Everything that I have done is a leap of faith.
“When I started out to make it as writer I had no contacts in literature or journalism other than the fact that I was an avid reader and I loved to write,” she noted.
Maireád is currently working on her second book. All for Grace is available in a number of local bookshops or online from www.maireadwhyte.com.