Every day brings a new story. And each day contributes to the art of story telling -- in prose and poetry, in music, on the stage, on the screen, and, of course, in books.
Today is the story of March 31st
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It is the 90th day of the year, leaving 275 days remaining in 2022.
On April 18, 2019, McKee, honored as being one of the "30 under 30" in the media to watch, was killed by a bullet as she observed and covered unrest in the Creggan section of Derry, where she was living.
Her murder brought an outpouring of sympathy, and leaders from around Ireland condemned the killing. Parties from across the sectarian divide in Northern Ireland -- including Sinn Fèin and the Ulster Unionist Party -- put out a joint statement calling it an "attack on all of the people of this community." The New IRA admitted it was behind the killing, said it was a mistake, and apologized. The prime ministers of England and Ireland attended her funeral.
For her part, McKee told her stories about the impact of The Troubles on her generation with heart, with eloquence, and with passion. She knew she was entering a dying profession, but strove to make it alive, and real, and relevant to the youth of Northern Ireland.
She wrote about high incidents of suicide among those born soon before or after the Good Friday Agreement in her report, Suicide of the Ceasefire Babies, published in 2016 in Mosaic, a health and science website. She wrote, "The tragic irony of life in Northern Ireland today is that peace seems to have claimed more lives than war ever did."
Two years earlier, she wrote Letter to My 14-Year-Old Self, about her experiences growing up gay and Catholic in Belfast. It began:
Kid, it's going to be OK. I know you're not feeling that way right now. You're sitting in school. The other kids are making fun of you. You told the wrong person you had a crush and soon, they all knew your secret. It's horrible. They make your life hell.
When she died, she was planning to propose to her partner, Sara Canning, whom she had moved to Derry to live with.
Her articles were published in the Belfast Telegraph, BuzzFeed News, The Guardian, and the Atlantic. At the times of her death, she was working on two books about The Troubles.
In 2018, she became a trustee of Headliners, an organization that helps teen-agers enter the field of journalism. She was one of its early successes.
On the night she was killed, she went out to cover the unrest over a rumors of guns being brought in to Derry before the commemoration of the 1916 Easter Rising. Police raided a house, but found nothing. People congregated on the streets. Bricks and petrol bombs were thrown. McKee was there to see what was going on. Shots rang out. One hit her in the head.
Eight men have been charged in connection with her murder.
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