About the book

This Side of the Light – A Child’s Reason to Be, is my debut novel: a paranormal novel based on a true story of family tragedy, love and hope.

Mai MacIntyre, born into a poverty-stricken rural community in South Wales, never knew her father. He was killed at the Battle of St Fagans only a few days after she was born in May, 1648. His brother takes over the family but treats them cruelly, taking out particular spite on Mai.

Her life is one of misery and drudgery. When she does find hope for happiness and a future, it is tragically dashed as she dies, aged just seven, in an outbreak of smallpox. Spirits come to guide her through the Light to the other side. Mai refuses to go. She is convinced that, if she does go with them, her brief life on Earth would have been meaningless and our feisty little spirit is having none of it. She knows that she will find a loving family on this side of the Light – her reason to be – and she will wait as long as it takes to find it.

By the 21st Century, her territory is eclipsed as humans (the breathers) have chopped down her beloved forest, destroyed her precious meadow and replaced them with their houses and roads. She is confined to the area of her old settlement, but a superstore has been built on the site and now surrounds her. She watches the breathers with interest. She is particularly drawn to one customer, Lizzie Phillips, but has no idea why. When Lizzie marries psychic medium, Matt Prosser, she plucks up the courage to make contact. They befriend Mai, giving her the loving home she has always craved. There are huge surprises along the way, but the couple are struggling to cope with Matt’s bipolar and psychosis.

During the second Covid lockdown, Lizzie develops depression and it threatens not only her belief in her husband’s psychic abilities, but in Mai herself – and Mai’s reason to be.