After work as a psychiatric nurse and a short spell in the Royal Horse Guards, Madigan appeared in minor roles on the London stage in 1963. From 1964 to 1975 he was a rating in the British Merchant Navy.
Madigan then attended Sidney Webb College and was awarded the BEd degree of the University of London in 1978. From 1979 to 1981 he worked in the educational arm of The Marine Society, edited The Seafarer magazine and taught at Gravesend Sea School. He taught at Fatih Lisesi (Fatih High School) in İzmir, Turkey from 1981 to 1982. He sailed to the Falkland Islands on MV Uganda for the Marine Society in 1982 before teaching in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets from 1983 to 1988.
In 1988, Madigan moved to Fuseta, in Algarve, Portugal, where he worked as a local journalist and published several books. He moved to the world-famous Marian apparitions city of Fátima, Portugal, in 1998, where he has published extensively about the Shrine (the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fátima), about Blessed Alexandrina of Balazar and other Catholic-oriented works.
Bibliographyedit
Non Fictionedit
Madigan has written short articles for The Seafarer, Blackwood's Magazine, Fairplay International Shipping Weekly and Catholic Life in the UK, Soul in the US and many English language publications in Portugal. His full-length works are:
Random Jottings for Young Seafarers. 1978. Marine Society
Safe or Sorry. 1980. Marine Society
The Devil is a Jackass. 1996. Gracewing. (UK). ISBN 0-85244-251-3
The Catholic Quiz Book. 1996. Gracewing. (UK). ISBN 972-99941-0-2
The Fatima Handbook. 2000. Gracewing. (UK). ISBN 0-85244-532-6
What Happened at Fatima. 2000. CTS. (UK). ISBN 1-86082-091-3; Fatima-Ophel. 2000. (Portugal). ISBN 186-08209-1-3
Princesses of the Kingdom. 2001. Kolbe. (Cork, Ireland). ISBN 0-9529627-4-8; 2003. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 972-95882-3-6
The Children of Fatima. 2003. Our Sunday Visitor. (USA). ISBN 1-931709-57-2
Why Fátima? 2004. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 972-95882-7-9
Armchair Fátima. 2005. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 972-99305-1-1
Alexandrina da Costa. 2005. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 972-95882-9-5
The 2nd Catholic Quiz Book. 2006. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 972-99941-0-2
The Fatima Guide. 2007. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 978-972-99941-3-5
The Irish Monstrance. 2009. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 978-972-99941-4-2
Exquisite Miniature. 2011. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 978-972-99941-6-6
The Golden Book of Fatima. 2013. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 978-989-8564-03-0
The Fatima Prayer Book. 2014 (9th printing). Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 978-972-99941-7-3
Fictionedit
In addition to short stories appearing in The Seafarer and East End Magazine in the UK and The Algarve Magazine in Portugal, Madigan has written the following full length fictional works:
Jackarandy. 1972. Elek. (UK), Quartet, 1974, ISBN 978-0-236-15442-5
The Bank of Infinite Reserves. 1987. Fatima-Ophel. (Portugal). ISBN 978-1-84024-032-0
The Weka-Feather Cloak. Bethlehem Books. (USA) 2002. ISBN 978-1-883937-68-3
Who Told You You Were Naked? Fatima-Orphel. (Portugal) 2008. ISBN 978-972-8981-07-5
Crystal Ball Cameos Fatima Books. 2014. ISBN 978-989-8564-10-8
^"Leo Madigan Home Page". Retrieved 15 January 2014.
^The Judging Team. "2010 Results". Yeovil Literary Prize. Retrieved 4 December 2013.
^Cook, Sharon (April 2012). "Meet the Winner" (PDF). Chudleigh Phoenix. Chudleigh Town Council. p. 5. Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 December 2013. Retrieved 16 December 2013. With a picture of Madigan.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
Interview: EWTN Bookmark – 2012-06-10 – Exquisite Miniature by Leo Madigan on YouTube