Paula Tully

Her Rebel Self Paula Tully

Dublin 1917. Dervla is twenty four and yearns for a life of adventure, away from the post Easter Rising rubble of her beloved city. When she says goodbye to her republican family and moves to London, she embarks on a liberating journey of self-discovery. She falls in love with Edmund, an Englishman, whose father keeps him out of the European trenches. But Dervla carries with her painful memories of the loss of her first love who was shot dead in the Rising. She is also tormented by her promise to her best friend to some day return to the homeland to take her place in the ongoing struggle for independence. When Dervla discovers the powerful voices of three revolutionary women, she knows her small acts of rebellion within the London-Irish movement are no longer enough. Dervla's cocooned life in London is soon overshadowed by the increasing violence of the English military's occupation in Ireland during a simmering new war. Dervla becomes secretive about her new rebel activities. By 1920, Dervla finds herself back in Dublin, without Edmund, where she risks her life as a Cumann na mBan member in her country's desperate fight for freedom. She becomes a target of the notorious Black and Tans. For months she questions whether Edmund will ever have the courage to defy his father by following her to Ireland to join the resistance movement. But a different type of betrayal awaits.