Cecelia Ahern is one of the great Irish success stories of our time. Her first novel, PS, I Love You, written when she was only 21, was among the biggest-selling debut novels of 2004.
Her second, Where Rainbows End, was an international bestseller too, while her third book – a gripping read called If You Could See Me Now, published this month by HarperCollins – was recently optioned by Walt Disney, for development as a musical to star Hugh Jackman.
Now 24, the former media communications student writes full-time from her apartment in north county Dublin, where she lives with her boyfriend of nearly five years.
A thoughtful individual with an easy laugh, Cecelia Ahern is gracious but firm when it comes to questions about her father, the Taoiseach, gently bringing the focus of our interview back to her own path.
Adrienne Murphy: Your new novel, If You Could See Me Now, is unusual in that the main protagonist is a spirit. Why do you find yourself taking this sort of angle in your fiction?
Cecelia Ahern: I think a lot of us agree that human beings aren’t the only things walking this earth. Whether you personally believe it or not, there are many people who sense this. In my books, I try to get everything in – men, women, children – everything that might exist on this planet. I’m always open to possibilities, and the possibility of other beings in existence is nice to explore.
My first book, PS, I Love You, also had a strong spiritual element, because it was about how the living can still have communication with someone who has died.
What else inspires you?
Life and living! Coming into contact with people and observing. That’s what my books are about – people’s lives, characters learning about themselves through interaction with others. I don’t go out to write romantic fiction, but when you’re writing about people’s lives I think, automatically, there’s going to be love involved. People are the way they are depending on the love they’ve had, or the lack of it.
Is there a strong autobiographical element to your work?
I suppose there’s an element of me that goes into the characters. I might take a part of me and exaggerate it completely. But I really don’t consider them to be me at all. Elizabeth, the main character in If You Could See Me Now, is very controlling, and I’m quite controlling in my work – a bit obsessive and compulsive about neatness and tidiness in my workspace. Elizabeth applies that to her entire life, which isn’t like me at all.
She’s got this routine in life and she’s not willing to change, even in her mothering relationship with children. She’s one of these people who sees the negative in everything. A lot of people are like that. Something happens and they’re immediately cynical about it.
Do you question yourself? And does this have a lot to do with why you’re a writer?
I think it’s my mentality to be always questioning, and my books are about that process. That’s life, isn’t it? To grow and evolve and develop and learn. You’re not going to stick to the same thing all the time. I’m trying to discover myself through my work.
How did you come to writing?
I always [wrote] from an early age as a hobby. It wasn’t any big deal. I just got an idea and wrote it down. I never thought it was going to be a career because you’re not really told those kind of things in school – that you could be an author. It just happened quite naturally, and I enjoyed it. In my teenage years, if I was really questioning things, then it would all go down on paper.
When did you start writing fiction?
When I was 14, I wrote half a book. From then on, I wrote fiction. Not every day, just when the moments came, which was probably a few times a week.
I started PS, I Love You after I finished college, while I was still living with my mum. I didn’t write it for any particular reason other than I wanted to. I used to start about 10 o’clock at night and write until six in the morning. I loved how quiet and calm it was at that time.
It took me three months to write. It was very quick. Now, that I’m living in a flat with my boyfriend, I tend to write more during the daytime.
You write your novels longhand. Why?
I like the process of writing with a pen. When I’m typing, it feels very mechanical. I’m concentrating on the letters more than on what I’m actually saying. When I’m writing, I like the flow of writing. It is much quicker to type, but it’s slower when it comes to writing because I’m stopping to think. When I’m writing with a pen, I’m constantly writing. I love a pen in my hand and seeing ink going onto paper.
Can any of your success be attributed to the fact that you’re the daughter of the Taoiseach?
People often say that. I understand where it’s coming from. I’ve gotten a lot of attention because I’m my dad’s daughter, and maybe I’ve gotten interviews that people wouldn’t usually be bothered doing. Being Bertie’s daughter wouldn’t have anything to do with getting publishing deals, but there’s no point in me running away from it completely and saying I’m doing this all by myself. Certainly, I am writing and promoting and selling the books by myself. But there is an element of added interest because of who I am.
Do you consider yourself political, in the ‘little p’ sense of the word?
Yeah, I suppose I am. I’m always very interested in women’s issues. This whole patriarchal society just wrecks my head. Obviously there are many injusticies in the world, but I always zone into that one.
Apart from the obvious, who’s your favourite politician?
I love Mary Hanafin. She’s a really strong woman. I love her speeches and the way she phrases things. I’ve met her a few times. I get a good feeling about her. Personally, I think she’s a lovely person.
What’s your opinion of TD Liz O’Donnell’s demand for an end to the ‘special relationship’ between church and state?
I personally think that an end to the church-state relationship would be a good idea. There shouldn’t be a link there, particularly when there’s so many other religions in the country, and people are looking to so many other things. [To give one religion special status] isn’t realistic, especially when so many people have been disillusioned by it.
Back to the books. Love is a major theme of your work. Yet you don’t fit into the classic romantic novel genre.
I don’t go for happy-ever-afters. I think sometimes my novels have been confused with the kind where the man rescues the woman, and my books are so not that! My female characters aren’t helpless. They are really strong people finding out about life for themselves. But as much as there’s a strong woman, there’s always a very strong man. My male characters are there to help the women along their journey of learning about themselves – like what I said earlier, that you learn about yourself through others – but not to rescue them.
The women rescue themselves, so my books are more realistic than ‘man rescues woman’, which I really can’t stand. In life, people help you to help yourself. No one person can rescue you. People who help aren’t there to make everything okay. They’re there to make you look into yourself, learn about yourself, and therefore help yourself.
Your books don’t romanticise marriage.
No, they don’t, because that’s certainly not how I feel. I wasn’t the little kid who dreamed of a big white wedding. It’ll never be my number one goal to get married – though I’ve no problem with people who have that as a goal. Some women know what ring they want from the age of 10.
I think as quickly as you can fall in love, you can fall out of it. There are people that can stay together forever and there are others that just can’t.
You can have many partners in life. I don’t think there’s just one person for you. I do believe in soul mates, but I think there are lots of potential soul mates. There are many people that you can be with in a lifetime, and it’s a decision, a choice you make to be with one, but they’re not the only one.
Are your feelings a reflection on your own long-term relationship?
No, I’m very much happy in my relationship. I’m not talking about moving on and finding anybody else any time soon. But I do think that it can happen. You can fall in love many times in your life.
It seems that it’s only in the past 15 years or so that Irish women have had the freedom to express these sort of opinions, let alone act on them.
Yeah, I know. Because it was supposed to be unnatural for us. We’re discovering so much about ourselves. We were so oppressed and repressed before. It was more the man who was allowed go out and have other partners, often whilst maintaining the marriage!
In Celtic Ireland women had so many rights and freedoms, and then suddenly it was all taken away and we’re only beginning to get them back now.
Do you explore female sexuality in your books?
Sexuality and monogamy are issues in my next book. There’s a female character who’s finding it difficult to be with one person.
I was watching a talk show on TV last night and there was a married couple on who had an open relationship. Not only did they sleep with other people, they had full-on emotional relationships with them.
The man had had a girlfriend for 10 months and he was devastated when they broke up, and he was crying on his wife’s shoulder and she was just so happy to be there for him!
That couple on telly didn’t have children, and if a child came into their relationship, I do find it hard to see how their kind of set-up would work or be positive for the child.
Do you think it’s because you come from a separated background that you diverge from traditional views of love and marriage?
I think so, yes. I was five when my parents separated. At the time, none of my friends had separated families. I’m sure it’s completely different for kids now. But I remember in school having a discussion about divorce, and the majority of the classs – we were about 11 at the time – were against it, saying it’s terrible, what about the children?
I was sitting there going, are you all bloody mad? [laughs] I can’t believe we’re even having this discussion. If something’s not working at home, if you can’t work at it and make it happen, just change it.
All those people who didn’t agree with it were people who were in happy homes. They were with parents who were in good relationships, and they didn’t understand how something like that could fall apart.
I remember being so frustrated in that class with people saying ‘no, it’s really bad’. I was thinking, you don’t even know! How could you say that, you 11-year-old, with your married parents?
I do think that marriage can work, and for some people it’s an absolutely wonderful thing. For others, it’s not. I suppose if you’re in a family that’s from a separated home, it does make you see both sides of the story. In our family the separation worked out really well. There were no problems at all.
Are you good friends with your parents?
Yeah, it’s lovely. I can talk very openly to both of them. I was never repressed by my parents. They didn’t have a Catholic ethos that repressed me. I couldn’t live in that environment, I’d be smothered by it. I need to be able to vent – to say what I need to say and do what I need to do.
If I’d had parents like that, I would be a very different person. I see friends in that situation, and it’s very frustrating for them not to be able to live their lives the way they feel they should be lived. I’m lucky in that my parents are open and understanding.
Your sister Georgina is married to Nicky Byrne from Westlife. Do you socialise with them a lot?
Yes I do. Georgina is a very good friend. We go out a lot together. I was there at the beginning of the whole Westlife thing. It was all very exciting, loads of going out after shows. But the band members are married and have children and stuff now. It’s a lot calmer.
Are you an extrovert or an introvert?
I think there’s an element of both. When I’m among people that I’m comfortable with, I feel outgoing. At other times, when I’m not so confident, I feel introverted. But I love people – meeting them and writing about them. They’re so interesting, and there’s so much scope for material with them because they’re so amazing.
What sort of music do you listen to?
Michael Jackson is one of my all-time favourites, and Prince, and Alicia Keys. At the moment I can’t stop listening to ELO’s Greatest Hits. In terms of Irish artists, I adore Aslan. I go to their concerts every year and their music is constantly on my stereo.
You’ve earned a huge amount of money through your writing. What do you plan to do with it?
Well, I’m still very young so hopefully there’s many years ahead of me. Who knows how long all this is going to last? I’d like to have a family in the future. So a lot of my money has to be saved and kept. Sometimes I rush around buying clothes. But I don’t really go splurging.
Are you health conscious?
I have an Indian doctor called Thrity Engineer who I go over to in London. She practices a technique called ‘bioluminetics’, which basically works to balance the mind between your female side and your male side. Bioluminetics is incredibly complex. I’m not even going to try explaining it.
Do you meet many male fans of your work?
Yes, lots. And I get a lot of letters from men. I hate this thing where people are surprised that men are reading my books. Men are getting much more in touch with their emotional sides, and coming out as people who have feelings at last!
What’s your idea of a really sexy man?
Let me think… [laughs with relish] There’s no one type. I like lots of men – though of course my boyfriend is number one! I like unusual, different men – men who aren’t afraid to try different things, who don’t fit the traditional roles of what it is to be a man, and are in touch with their feminine sides. The kind who’d be comfortable wearing a sarong, say.
Do you come across snobbery in literary circles about popular fiction?
I think some people think that if a book’s heartwarming, it lacks intelligence. But popular fiction is really just novels that are accessible to people. People can identify with the characters, there’s nothing too challenging, so they are easier for people to read. I’m quite open to admitting that my novels are like that – it’s no big secret. I’m happy with the genre that I’m in.