Harriett Jay

A now largely-forgotten novelist and playwright, HJ was prolific and popular in the late nineteenth to early twentieth century. She wrote eight novels, the majority devoted to the contemporary state of Ireland from an Anglo viewpoint and in a style reminiscent of the sensation novel or romance. Her novels are out of print, but most are available online. HJ also co-wrote ten plays—in both comedic and melodramatic style—with her adopted father, Robert Williams Buchanan . After Buchanan's death she wrote as her final work his biography.