New radio documentary explains the unusual discovery of Nuala O'Faolain's long-lost Australian sister after life of secrecy

Nuala O'Faolain, an Irish writer whose memoir Are You Somebody? was published in 1996, died in 2008. Her father, journalist Tomás O'Faolain known as Terry O'Sullivan, had a bohemian life and multiple affairs. A radio documentary titled The Other Nuala centers on the emergence last year of a sister who had been kept secret for years. The idea began when Colm Tóibín met a woman named Nuala at a book signing in Australia. She had read Are You Somebody? and noticed a detail on page 10 stating that Terry O'Sullivan fathered a child out of wedlock and that the mother took the child to Australia. The woman realized the description matched her own life and connected with documentary maker Yetti Redmond, who later located the father’s former photographer.

"Page 10 in Nuala O'Faolain's book said that Nuala O'Faolain's father, the journalist Terry O'Sullivan, fathered a child out of wedlock, as they say, and the mother took the child to Australia,"

"Oddly enough, the daughter was called Nuala. As this woman read this, she suddenly realised 'that's me, that's me'."

"Mr Tóibín said that the woman, whose name was also Nuala, spotted a detail on page 10 of Ms O'Faolain's book which appeared to identify the woman herself."

Read at Irish Independent