The 20 stories that make up Orange Horses, first published as a collection in 1990, richly illustrate the plight of marginalised women in contemporary Irish society. Kelly draws from a variety of personalities and circumstances: an islander fights to eke out an existence for herself and her brother; a Traveller mourns the loss of her unborn child and struggles for economic independence; a nurse in London works to maintain her Irish identity. Orange Horses is a beautiful, sad and funny collection of stories of the undervalued, the oppressed and the quietly heroic.