Birmingham author Maura Murphy, whose hard-hitting autobiography about her eventful life is currently riding high in the bestsellers' list, has died aged 77.
Her book, called Don't Wake Me at Doyles, charts her life growing up shoeless in poverty-stricken Ireland, her long battle with crippling depression, two heart attacks, walking out on a 50-year marriage and bringing up nine children.
Ms Murphy was awarded a six-figure advance when she submitted her manuscript to a publisher last year.
The book is currently number three in the paperback bestsellers' list.
The authoress started writing it five years ago when she was 72 after being diagnosed with cancer.
At the time she was living in Ireland where she had retired with her family after bringing up the family in Birmingham.
The diagnosis served as a catalyst for her to pursue a lifelong interest in writing and desire to set down the story of her life.
"I knew I was still alive for a reason," she said recently.
"To tell the story of my life, to create something special to leave my children and grandchildren."
And so in 2000, Ms Murphy walked out on her unhappy marriage, moved back to Birmingham, bought a computer and began to type.
The title of the book refers to both the local pub where her husband spent much of his time and the Irish tradition of "laying out" the deceased at wakes.
One of 11 children growing up in County Offaly, Ireland, Maura went barefoot, wore home-made knickers and was often sent to beg for scraps of food from a nearby family. She left school at 14 to work as a servant and ended up in a hostel for the destitute when she was eight months pregnant with her ninth child.
"My husband was out of work at the time, and in those days food came first and rent came second," she said.
"I went to every bank and building society to raise money to pay the mortgage, but they weren't interested. It was humiliating, terrifying and maddening at the same time."
After giving birth to nine children and suffering three miscarriages, Ms Murphy was told another pregnancy would kill her and so she had a hysterectomy.
Aged 37, then suffered a breakdown and for the next 13 years suffered from suicidal thoughts and overwhelming despair.
She was prescribed sedatives which triggered terrifying hallucinations and she soon found herself addicted to them changing her life for ever.
"They took away my right to think for myself," she told one interviewer.
"I was frightened and fearful of going out and I suffered an early menopause. I even tried to commit suicide at one point. I battled those feelings every day but, for the sake of my children, I couldn't let myself fall completely."
It was while watching a TV programme when she was in her 50s explaining the long-term damaging effects of tranquillisers that she resolved to come off them.
Over an 18 months period she succeeded and reclaimed her mental wellbeing which gave her the impetus to write.
For the next 20 years she scribbled down memories from her life in diaries and journals.
Ms Murphy, who has 11 grandchildren and two great-grandchildren, was working on the sequel to her life when she died.
A funeral mass for her takes place this Sunday at the Birmingham Oratory in Hagley Road, Edgbaston.
She will be cremated at Lodge Hill Crematorium in Selly Oak on Monday, October 17 at 12.45pm.
