“I have lived life to the fullest, but my interior life is where I live,” Edna O’Brien told The Guardian in 2012. In just three weeks in 1960, the Irish author wrote The Country Girls, her debut novel about two young Irish women who find husbands in London, only to discover that wedded life is not what they had hoped. Lauded for addressing women’s social and sexual issues at a time when such topics were taboo, the book launched O’Brien’s career—but faced backlash, often banned and burned in Ireland. O’Brien moved to London as a young woman, hosting glamorous dinner parties and joining a social circle that included Shirley MacLaine, Marlon Brando, and Jane Fonda. A prolific writer, she published 34 books, several plays, as well as pieces for the New York Times. O’Brien died this July, at the age of 93, leaving an indelible mark. “Within minutes, you’re telling her all these secrets,” says Sinéad O’Shea, the director of a new documentary on O’Brien that combines interviews, archival footage, and readings from her author’s diaries to capture a magnetic and complex legacy. —Jeanne Malle