Every Inch A Saint

The true story, woven with fiction, of Eileen O’Connor—Australia’s saint-in-waiting

In this inspirational novel, a family traumatized by addiction and catastrophe discover their great-grandmother’s lost account of Australia’s saint-in-waiting—a severely disabled woman who barely survived childhood but defied the Catholic Church and provided free nursing care in Sydney’s slums—and miracles happen. With a dual timeline, novelist Kate Clinch weaves the story of Eileen O’Connor, whose cause for sainthood is currently active in Rome, with the lives of a fictional contemporary family a century after her death.

The backdrop is Sydney in the midst of World War I and the Spanish Flu. Eileen is crippled by tuberculosis, partial paralysis, and interminable pain. Her determination and faith that she is called to help others, drives her to establish a private domiciliary nursing organization, and brings her into conflict with the Catholic hierarchy. A diverse array of colorful fictional characters and situations also then help bring to life this twentieth-century story of courage and resiliency. One of Eileen’s friends, believing her to be a living saint, records Eileen’s story, leaving it to be found like a lost artifact, in 2019.

Author Biography

Born in England, Kate Clinch has lived in Australia since she was six. After a near-death experience, she left her medical practice and began researching and writing about spiritual matters—especially mysterious soul connections and miraculous healings. She’s co-authored research papers as a doctor, in the 1990’s wrote regular columns on garden history for Australian Doctor magazine, and in the 2000’s on homeschooling for Education Choices magazine. Her first novel was long-listed in Australia for the Richell Prize for Emerging Writers.

In 2020, after meeting Eileen O’Connor’s nuns to discuss Every Inch a Saint, she wrote them a medical report to support the investigation into her sainthood. She lives in Adelaide.