Last week, Warwick's Independent Bookstore in La Jolla, California, hosted author Dan Lawton to celebrate ABOVE THE GROUND: A True Story of The Troubles in Northern Ireland. Attendees at this sold-out event had an opportunity to connect with Dan Lawton as he presented some of his research and signed copies of the book. Literary discussions and events like this one serve as powerful reminders of the profound impact that books have on our … [Read more...]
Author Dan Lawton Hopes ABOVE THE GROUND Can Create Space for Important Conversations Amidst Divisive Times
When Kevin Barry Artt was born, his mother had to give birth to him in a convent in a small town, out of sight of people who would be scandalized that a baby had a Protestant dad and a Catholic mother. If he'd died some years ago, he might have been buried in a cemetery in Ballymurphy that is said to have an underground wall, invisible from the surface, that divides Catholic dead from Protestant dead. The bigotry and absurdity of it seem … [Read more...]
Author Dan Lawton Calls Kevin Barry Artt’s Journey a ‘Metaphor for Northern Ireland Itself’
That Artt's adoptive parents named him after a revered Irish patriot, Kevin Barry, suggests that he, too, is a patriot and a freedom fighter-which, really, he isn't. He was an accidental hero. He didn't seek out the violence and abuse that the British poured onto him. He stumbled into them by accident. He didn't ask for the legal abuse that U.S. prosecutors Mark Zanides and Sara Criscitelli, a couple of modern-day Javerts, later laid onto … [Read more...]
Gallery | ABOVE THE GROUND: A True Story of the Troubles in Northern Ireland by Dan Lawton
Dan Lawton's ABOVE THE GROUND: A True Story of The Troubles in Northern Ireland delves into the gripping realm of true crime, Irish history, prison escape, and the remarkable redemption of an unjustly accused man entangled in the complexities of an IRA murder. This photo gallery complements the absorbing account. … [Read more...]
Author Dan Lawton Ponders: “Who were really the good guys and the bad guys?”
As a kid, I found the Troubles hard to understand. The American media just didn't do a good job of explaining clearly who, exactly, were the opposing parties, and what things they wanted out of the war that was going on in Northern Ireland. At times, they made it seem like a religious war of sorts, which it wasn't. I read about Bobby Sands dying in 1981, in the U.S. media, which conferred a kind of stardom on him. But, to me, the coverage … [Read more...]
Meet Author Dan Lawton
I'm a writer and lawyer. My short fiction and columns have appeared in The Recorder, Los Angeles Daily Journal, The Pensive Quill, The Daily Transcript, and Sheepshead Review. ABOVE THE GROUND: A True Story of The Troubles in Northern Ireland is my first work of narrative nonfiction. I was born in Los Angeles and raised in Fullerton, California, along with my three younger brothers. I earned my undergraduate degree … [Read more...]
ABOVE THE GROUND: A True Story of The Troubles in Northern Ireland—a tale of courage, injustice, and redemption by Dan Lawton
In 1978, the bloody conflict in Northern Ireland, known as The Troubles, reached a boiling point. Hundreds of members of the Irish Republican Army determined to drive the hated British out of the province-killing soldiers and police, detonating bombs, while arming themselves with firearms and explosives-were arrested and incarcerated in a notorious British prison known as the Maze. Sunday, November 26, 1978, two IRA gunmen kicked in the … [Read more...]
