'Did Ye Hear Mammy Died?' is a grief memoir that shuns sentimentality

In the early days of the pandemic lockdown that had us all behaving as though we were shut in by a blizzard that would soon thaw, I Netflix-binged a perfect television show: Derry Girls. Set in Derry, Northern Ireland, in the mid-1990s, Derry Girls captures the mundanity and angst of teenage girlhood during the tail end of the Troubles.

The steady drumbeat of violence in the region acts as background noise to more pressing matters, like being banned from the chippy shop, performing a step aerobics routine to "Like a Prayer," and coming up with content for the school newspaper.

The brilliance of lies in how it reminds us that regular people lived regular lives during the Troubles, that growing up in a place like Derry does, has a memoir out, titled