Maeve Binchy was born in 1940 in Dalkey, County Dublin and is an Irish novelist, newspaper columnist and speaker.
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She was educated at University College Dublin, and worked as a teacher, then a journalist at The Irish Times and later became a writer of novels and short stories.
Many of her novels are set in Ireland, dealing with the tensions between urban and rural life, the contrasts between England and Ireland, and the dramatic changes in Ireland between World War II and the present day. Her novel Circle of Friends was made into a 1995 Hollywood movie starring Chris O'Donnell and Minnie Driver.
Binchy announced in 2000 that she would not be going on tours with any more novels, but would be devoting her time to other activities, and to her husband, Gordon Snell, a children's author. She has written five further novels since then — Quentins, Nights of Rain and Stars, Whitethorn Woods, Heart and Soul and Minding Frankie (2010). She lives in Dalkey, not far from where she grew up.
In 1978, Binchy won a Jacob's Award for her RTÉ play, Deeply Regretted By. A second award went to the lead actor, Donall Farmer.