The House Children is based on the true stories of five women who grew up in the same institution - Saint Joseph's Industrial School in Ballinasloe, Galway. The women wanted to remain anonymous, so author Heidi Daniele wrote the story as a novel. In addition to the interviews, she obtained documents including birth certificates, court orders of detention, education and heath records, photographs, newspaper articles, and she met with the Sisters of Mercy, visited Ballinasloe, and assisted the women in filing for restitution through the Redress Board. In this presentation, she will take us through the documents she discovered and tell the story of these real lives, forever changed by conservative Ireland.