Maeve Connell is an 11-year-old Belfast-born girl peddling her mother¿s homemade Irish whiskey on Detroit¿s Eastside. During the Detroit Gaelic League¿s St. Patrick¿s feis on March 17, 1922, Maeve witnesses the support from the Detroit section of the Irish diaspora for a united Ireland. She senses how politically charged her birth was.
Made in Belfast is from a collection of short stories called Little-Known Lives in the Motor City. Each story zooms a lens on Detroiters surviving and thriving during the city¿s ups and downs of the twentieth century. The characters portray individuals the author imagined as regular Detroiters living through important true events in Detroit. Though the characters were formed in the author's imagination, details about each character were historically derived.