Heiress, Rebel, Vigilante, Bomber

The Extraordinary Life of Rose Dugdale

By: Sean O'Driscoll

Narrated by: Gerry O'Brien

Brought to you by penguin.

The astonishing story of the English heiress who devoted her life to the IRA

She grew up in a Chelsea townhouse and on a Devon estate.

She was presented to the Queen at Buckingham Palace as a debutante in 1958.

She trained at Oxford as an academic economist and had a love affair with a female professor (who was on the rebound from Iris Murdoch).

At thirty, she commenced giving her inheritance away to the poor.

In 1972, the deadliest year of the Northern Irish Troubles, she travelled to Ireland and joined the IRA.

Sean O'Driscoll's Heiress, Rebel, Vigilante, Bomber tells the astonishing story of Rose Dugdale, who went on to become a committed terrorist, participating in a major art heist and a bombing raid on a police and army barracks; who kept a pregnancy secret for nine months in prison and gave birth there; and who ended up at the heart of the IRA's bomb-making operation during its deadly final spasms in the 1990s. Heiress, Rebel, Vigilante, Bomber is both the page-turning biography of a remarkable woman and a groundbreaking account of the inner workings of a terrorist organization.

© Sean O'Driscoll 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022

Critic reviews

Fascinating . . . O'Driscoll's research is impressive (Ben Macintyre)

Riveting (Roy Foster)

Generous and well researched (Rosa Lyster)

An absorbing, well-researched and extremely well-written account of a life that almost defies belief (David McCullagh)

Superb . . . an even-handed and thrilling gallop through [Dugdale's] improbable life

Possibly the most extraordinary book you'll read this year

Unputdownable . . . jaw-dropping (Joe Duffy)

It would be hard to overstate how good this book is . . . a fantastic read (Eilis O'Hanlon)

[A] pacey, well-researched book (Frank Coughlin)

Well-researched . . . balanced (Charles Lysaght)