The Glorious Guinness Girls imagines the early lives of the three rich sisters in the 1920s

They were beautiful, wealthy and the talk of the town. A new book paints a picture of the Guinness girls and their lives in 1920s Dublin

1st December 1931: The Hon Mrs Brinsley Plunket (Aileen Guinness) and her dog. (Photo by Sasha/Getty Images)

Not for nothing do we talking about ‘truth’ being ‘stranger’ than fiction. Often, fiction is easier to manage than fact. It’s tidier, more malleable. 

So what happens when fact has to mingle with fiction? This is something I encountered while researching for my new novel, The Glorious Guinness Girls, which weaves reality and imagination to create a story of the early lives of the three girls  — the daughters of Arthur Ernest Guinness; Aileen, Maureen and Oonagh  — first in Ireland against a backdrop of the Civil War, and then in London during the Roaring Twenties.