Sir – I hadn’t yet read my Sunday Independent (December 31) when a man I know tapped me on the shoulder to tell me he had read a wonderful short story by Ciara Ferguson, called The Little Smashed Girl, while having his coffee in a St Stephen’s Green cafe. “Do read it”, he said.
It was a wonderful read and captured, so accurately, what we have begun to take for granted in our capital city and beyond. Ciara portrayed the many emotions, some hidden, when telling the story of this young, homeless woman in Dublin. It was fiction, maybe in this instance, but so real. While we are bombarded with statistics on a daily basis, I hope this didn’t deter people for reading this short tale. It should be read by those with responsibility for planning and delivery of services – because it’s what so many homeless people are experiencing today, but they are often unable to articulate their problem.
Alice Leahy,
Alice Leahy Trust
Dublin 8
