The Queen of Dirt Island is set in rural Ireland in the decades before and after the turn of the 21st century. This time period is significant in the history of Ireland. From the 1960s to the late 1990s, Northern Ireland was consumed by a period of significant ethno-nationalist conflict between Unionists, a majority of whom were Ulster Protestants who supported Northern Ireland remaining in the United Kingdom, and Republicans, many of whom were Irish Catholics who wanted Northern Ireland to leave the UK and join the Republic of Ireland. This conflict was known as the Troubles.

Though the Aylwards live in the Republic of Ireland, they still feel the effects of the Troubles. The most direct connection to the conflict in the novel is through the character of Paudie, who has ties to the Provisional Irish Republican Army, a paramilitary organization fighting on the side of the Irish Catholics. Early on in The Queen of Dirt Island, Paudie is arrested for storing IRA weapons in his barn. Years later, he is released as a part of the Good Friday Agreement, which was the culmination of the Irish peace process and ended the long-running war. While Paudie is involved with sectarian political violence, the rest of the family maintains a distance from the IRA; in fact, in response to Paudie being arrested,

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