Ireland in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was not a good place to be a woman. Among the wave of emigrants from Ireland to North America were many, many young women who travelled on their own, hoping for a better life. Some lived lives of quiet industry and piety. Others quickly found themselves in trouble - bad trouble, and on an astonishing scale. Dr Elaine Farrell and Dr Leanne McCormick, creators of the celebrated ‘Bad Bridget’ podcast, have unearthed a world in which Irish women actually outnumbered Irish men in prison. They reveal the social forces that bred this mayhem and dysfunction, through stories that are brilliantly strange, sometimes funny, and often moving. From sex workers and thieves to kidnappers and killers, these
Bridgets are young women who have gone from the frying pan of their impoverished homeland to the fire of vast North American cities.

Dr Elaine Farrell is a Reader in the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen’s University Belfast, and co-creator with Leanne McCormick of the Bad Bridget project.

Dr Leanne McCormack Leanne McCormick is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Arts and Humanities at Ulster University and co-creator with Elaine Farrell of the Bad Bridget project.

Dr Derville Murphy was born in the UK but came to live in Ireland when she was 13 years old. She qualified from DIT as an architect in 1978 and then worked for over twenty years as an architect and art curator. At fifty-two, she went back to college and completed an MPhil in Irish Art History and a Ph.D. in art and
architecture at UCD. Derville has worked as an art consultant. She is also an artist who has exhibited widely in Ireland and her works are in several art collections. Although she has written articles for academic journals, The Art Collector’s Daughter, published in 2020 is her debut novel.