Inga Simpson helped finish off the manuscript for 'Inheritance' after author Kath O'Connor died of cancer

Inheritance by Dr Kath O'Connor was published posthumously from the last manuscript she wrote from her hospital bed in 2019 with help from her family and from mentor Inga Simpson.

Kath's partner Rachael Findlay said Kath had always had a love for writing and an eye for a story.

While she wrote for and edited medical journals professionally, her great love was always fiction.

"Kath had always been a writer. As a child, she always wrote," Rachael said.

"She always wanted to write and was worried it would never happen for her."

In 2018, Kath reached out to Moruya local Inga Simpson with the first draft of a manuscript she had been working on and asked to be mentored.

At the time, Inga, now author of seven books including Understory, Mr Wigg and Willowman, was mentoring many different writers through the publishing process.

The pair connected immediately, and Kath would send Inga through 50 pages a fortnight, for feedback and discussion.

Slowly a manuscript started to form.

However, this mentorship was different to many others. Where normally author and mentor will back-and-forth over time and carve out a book after many months - even years - this time there was an element of hurry. From the start of the mentorship, Kath told Inga she'd been diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2015.

Kath's original story concept was a love story between Rose and Salima - now two characters in Inheritance. However, when Kath was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, she started to investigate her own family and it shaped the story.

She found out her paternal grandmother Eileen had died of ovarian cancer. That was something neither she nor her father had ever known.

The storyline of Kath's novel morphed to reflect the reality she was living through.

Inheritance traces the lives of two women - grandmother and granddaughter - living decades apart but both possessing a dangerous mutation of the BrCa1 gene and therefore at high risk of cancer. As the granddaughter Rose explores more of the secret past of her grandmother Nellie, she realises how intertwined their lives are.

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However, just as Rose grows sicker and sicker throughout the novel, so too Kath's condition was deteriorating.

"[The writing] got slower and slower as she got more treatment and had surgery," Rachael said.

"The work slowed but she never stopped working on it. Right at the end, when she was told she was going to die, she couldn't believe it. She didn't think she was going to die until she had finished her novel. She was sending her parents out on some research trips to investigate the historical parts of the novel. She was still sitting up in her hospital bed with her computer on her lap writing.

"This was the most important thing for her as she got sicker."

Inga said the emotion Kath was feeling dripped into the sentences she was writing, becoming a form of escapism and adding a poignant depth to the book.

"When I read the scenes of Nellie dying, I found it difficult and very moving," she said.

"She was writing these sentences knowing this was going to happen to her - she is probably going to pass away.

"She wanted to finish the book."

However, Kath died in November 2019, aged 45. She left behind an almost-complete manuscript.

"You always think you have more time," Inga said.

Kath's father and Rachael worked with Inga and asked her to finish the manuscript, polishing out some of the rough edges.

Inga tried to use the lightest of touches when pulling the threads of Kath's second draft together into the final manuscript. That the voice stayed the same was important to her and, what she didn't foresee, was even more important to those who knew Kath.

"I found myself reluctant to change too much," Inga said.

"This is the public's only chance to hear Kath O'Connor's voice.

"It was letting her voice shine."

Inheritance was published by Affirm Press in January 2023.

Kath's love for writing left a trail of love behind her: Those around her treasured receiving handwritten poems and cards from Kath over many years as thoughtful gifts.

Inheritance now sits alongside these letters on the bookshelves of loved-ones and strangers - and captures Kath's voice and outlook on the world.

"It's having Kath still," Rachael said.

"It has taken me until recently to be able to read the book as a novel - I still just hear it as Kath's voice."

"People have said they feel like they are having a visit with Kath. The way she noticed the world comes across in the novel.

While Rachael delights in seeing Kath's book published and her legacy go on, she sees a great unfairness in the situation.

"She would have been so excited to be able to see this in bookshops and on people's bookshelves," she said.

"This was her dream and sadly it has happened now and she doesn't get to enjoy it.

"It still feels unfair that I have to do it instead of her."

For Inga, the beauty and quality of Inheritance makes Kath's death all the more tragic.

"I feel absolutely certain she would have had a writing career," she said.

"She could have had her dream. She wasn't around to see it happen. She never knew it would be published. She never had the joy of talking about it and hearing public responses."

"This was so important to her - to write a novel and have it published."