"Flowers of the Fairest"- Irish book

By one of the strangest coincidences ever the daughter of a close neighbour in Wales, whom I had met only once and that was over 40 years ago in Iceland, emailed me last night to say that she had been into the Wellcome Institute in London and picked up some brochures and found Dr Carole Reeves article on the "Children of Craig-y-nos" project.

Now...wait for it. A friend of hers has written a book about her own experiences with TB in Dublin during the 1940's.

The book is called ""Flowers of the Fairest" by Rosemary Conry ( published by Brandon).
This is a resume of it - taken from the Amazon web book-site:

"THREE YOUNG GIRLS LIE SIDE BY SIDE STRAPPED ON TO IRON FRAMES ON THE VERANDA OF A TB HOSPITAL IN THE 1940S. ALL THREE ARE JUST SEVEN YEARS OLD, AND AHEAD OF THEM LIE THREE YEARS OF SHARING THEIR THOUGHTS, PITTING THEIR WITS AGAINST EACH OTHER, SOMETIMES FALLING OUT AND ALL THE TIME DREAMING OF HOME WHICH SEEMS AS FAR AWAY AS HEAVEN.

Set in north Dublin against a background of strict social and religious mores, wartime restrictions and fearsome medical practice, their story is memorably and movingly told by Rosemary Conry.

Rich in pathos and humour, it is a story of survival and even triumph over the cruelty of their fate.

Pauline is a frail, saintly child, an orphan with no home to go to but trusting that a lovely place will be found for her, when the time comes. Eileen, a lively, red-haired girl from a large, poor family down the country, lies on a spinal frame, bent backwards so that her view of the world is upside down.
Rose-Mary, from quite a well-off Dublin southside family, lies on a hip frame between Pauline and Eileen, exerting power over them both because she owns a magnificent doll and has regular visits from her father. The relationships between the three girls are subtly and movingly described, providing the core of this remarkable book.

But there are other memorable figures: Sister Finbar, the powerful authority figure, who keeps a watchful, loving eye on them all, keeping the children's spirits up with small rewards, reminding them of their privileged position in the eyes of God; Wastras, the vehemently anti-British schoolteacher, and Kathleen, the nosiest of the patients: when she is sent home to die, the three companions accept that however awful she was in life, she has now become an angel, wearing a crown of golden roses."