In The Irish Times this Saturday, John Patrick McHugh tells Edel Coffey about his debut novel, Fun and Games. And there is a Q&A with Lisa Harding about her latest novel, The Wildelings.
Reviews are Oliver Farry on The Great Betrayal: The Struggle for Freedom and Democracy in the Middle East Fawaz A Gerges; Karlin Lillington on Careless People: A Story of Where I Used to Work by Sarah Wynn-Williams; Daniel McLaughlin on Life in Spite of Everything by Victoria Donovan; Edel Coffey on The Marriage Vendetta by Caroline Madden; Frank Wynne on the best new fiction in translation; John Boyne on Ordinary Saints by Niamh Ní Mhaoileoin; Daniel Geary on Good Trouble: The Selma, Alabama and Derry, Northern Ireland Connection 1963-1972 by Forest Issac Jones; Ray Burke on Becoming Irish American by Timothy J Meagher; Helen Cullen on The Wildelings by Lisa Harding; Paraic O’Donnell on Open, Heaven by Seán Hewitt; and Kevin Power on Fun and Games by John Patrick McHugh.
This weekend’s Irish Times Eason offer is The Heart in Winter by Kevin Barry, just €5.99, a €6 saving.
Jane Casey and Stuart Neville have been longlisted for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year 2025. Casey has been recognised for A Stranger in the Family and Neville for Blood Like Mine. Also shortlisted is Birmingham Irish author Marie Tierney for Deadly Animals.
Three former winners are vying for top honours at this year’s Awards, including 2023 champion MW Craven, who is longlisted for his adrenaline-fuelled US-set thriller The Mercy Chair, alongside Chris Whitaker for All the Colours of the Dark, a million-copy bestseller exploring the aftermath of a childhood kidnapping, and Chris Brookmyre for the highly original thriller, The Cracked Mirror, which sees a hard-bitten homicide detective and an old lady who has solved multiple murders in her sleepy village, crack an impossible case. Highly commended in 2023, Elly Griffiths receives an impressive tenth longlisting for The Last Word, a murder mystery set at a writers’ retreat.
Readers are now encouraged to vote for their favourite novels to reach the shortlist, with the winner crowned on the opening night of the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate on July 17th.
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Tickets for the Belfast Book Festival are now on sale with a packed programme of poetry, fiction, crime writing, journalism, screenwriting, plus developmental opportunities and expert-led discussions and workshops.
The 15th edition of the Festival will run from June 5th-12th at The Crescent Arts Centre in south Belfast. Highlights include Game of Thrones star Kristain Nairn and his new book that documents life on the set of one of the world’s most popular TV shows, Sam McAlister former BBC Newsnight producer and author of Scoops: Behind the Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking Interviews, as well as many other author events from Joseph O’Connor, Wendy Erskine, Tessa Hadley, Eimear McBride, Luke Harding, Darran Anderson, Eoin McNamee, Roddy Doyle, Andrea Carter, Neil Hegarty, Noreen Masud, Claire Lynch, Roisin O’Donnell, Jan Carson, Gráinne O’Hare and Thomas Morris among others.
As ever, there will be a celebration of emerging talent with the announcement of the Mairtín Crawford Awards. Festival commemorative events will honour Michael Longley and Edna O’Brien.
Art lovers should check out The Art of Translation, the festival’s exhibition that offers a fantastic snapshot of international book design via leading Irish writers, presented in collaboration with Literature Ireland. Tickets can be be found at belfastbookfestival.com
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The Shaking Bog festival hosts a one-day programme of events in the Glencree Valley, Co Wicklow, on May 17th, featuring a Dawn Chorus Walk with Sean Ronayne, Moth Magic with Ciarán Finch, Exploring the River Valley with Martha Burton, Wildflowers & Pollinators with Prof Jane Stout, ‘What is Wild?’ a talk by Mark Cocker and in conversation with Ella McSweeney, and a Concert & Reading with Jane Robinson, Lynda O’Connor & Ailbhe McDonagh.
Booking is essential - shakingbog.ie/riverscapes
The Shaking Bog Festival is embarking on a new project. Entitled Riverscapes, this creative exploration of place, heritage and nature will run from May to October. Riverscapes is a place-based initiative which will celebrate, enliven and inform the communities of both people and nature that live in and around the Glencree and Dargle Rivers. And, in turn, share this experience with the wider world.
The Riverscapes project will culminate with a new film by acclaimed local film-maker Alan Gilsenan - that will not only draw on the people and habitats of this richly diverse community but will also belong to that community. It is a film that will hopefully reflect life at its most local whilst also mirroring the universal.
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Penguin, Sandycove is to publish Andy Farrell’s autobiography, The Only Way I Know, on October 16th.
Publisher Michael McLoughlin said: "Andy Farrell is rightly seen on these islands as one of the most remarkable sports people and coaches of all time. He has played and been hugely successful in both rugby codes and as a successful coach he has brought the Ireland team to the top of the world rankings and to consecutive Six Nations championship titles. The Lions tour to Australia this summer, under his leadership, will hopefully be another highlight. I am delighted to publish this book, which is as stellar as his career."
Farrell said: “It has been a really interesting and enjoyable process reflecting on my life and career, and working with Gavin Mairs to bring it all together. I have tried to be honest and true to myself, and I hope that is reflected in the book.”
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For the third consecutive year, Denis Shaughnessy, writing under the pseudonym Marco Ocram, has won First Prize for Humour at the Chanticleer International Book Awards (CIBA) in the United States.
This literary hat-trick crowns Ocram’s ‘Awful Truth’ series of metafictional satires. Each of the three novels has now won the top prize in the humour category, a rare feat in the world of indie and international publishing.
“I was thrilled to win once, amazed to win twice, and by the third time I thought perhaps the judges needed checking,” joked Shaughnessy. “But really, it’s an honour to see readers and critics connect with something so deliberately absurd.”
The awards, held annually in Washington state, draw thousands of entries from across the globe, celebrating excellence in independent and small press publishing.
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Waterford Council is running the annual Molly Keane Creative Writing Award. This is a short story competition in memory of the Irish author. The stories must be 2,000 words or less, and entries must be in by noon on May 19th. Entries are only accepted via this link.
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The Dublin Small Press Fair has opened a call for applications from publishers of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, experimental literature, literary journals, artists’ books, zines, chapbooks, broadsides, and more.
The first annual fair, organised by Tim Groenland and Éireann Lorsung, will take place over two days in November in Pearse Street Library (with support from Dublin Unesco City of Literature). The fair will celebrate small-scale publishing in Ireland as well as welcoming small presses from abroad, showcasing the innovative and experimental work of small literary presses while providing a space of connection in which publishers can share knowledge and develop relationships.
It will feature readings, launches, panels, and exhibitions alongside many tables of books and book-adjacent work from about thirty small and independent presses, journals, book binders, zine makers, and more.
Applications are free, and the deadline is July 1st. See dublinsmallpressfair.com for more information.
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John Connolly, Marita Conlon-McKenna and Elaine Feeney, will be interviewed over three separate evenings in Kennys Bookshop, Galway in May, to celebrate the launch of their new books. Tickets are available now on kennys.ie.
On May 1st, crime fiction writer John Connolly will be interviewed about his new novel, The Children of Eve, the latest instalment in his bestselling Charlie Parker series.
On May 15th, Marita Conlon-McKenna will be launching her Children of The Famine Trilogy of novels (Under the Hawthorn Tree, Wildflower Girl and Fields of Home), published in one volume for the very first time! She will be joined in conversation by bookseller and author Gráinne O’Brien.
Award-winning Galway poet and novelist Elaine Feeney will be launching her new novel, Let Me Go Mad in My Own Way on May 27th in conversation with Sarah Kenny. Feeney’s previous novel How to Build a Boat was longlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize.
Tickets are free but limited. To book, visit kennys.ie/events
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Marty Whelan will launch Killester: from medieval manor to garden suburb by Joseph Brady & Ruth McManus on Tuesday, April 29th at 7.30pm in Killester Donnycarney Football Club, Hadden Park, Killester, Dublin 5.
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The Seamus Heaney HomePlace has launched its summer programme.
Highlights include comedian Frank Skinner in conversation with Belfast-based poet Scott McKendry on June 27th talking about his love of poetry, as evidenced in his acclaimed Poetry Podcast which is now in its tenth series.
On August 10th, Kabosh Theatre Company presents Julie - a new one-woman play written and performed by Charlotte McCurry. Set in West Belfast in 1981, it follows a teenage girl as she navigates the loss of her sister and her family’s struggle for justice.
Author events include Eimear McBride (May 29th); Nathan Thrall (June 2nd); Glenn Patterson (10th); Paul Lynch (14th);
On June 25th, Patterson welcome this year’s Seamus Heaney Centre Fellows, author Jan Carson, poet Fiona Benson, and screenwriters Adam Patterson and Declan Lawn (Blue Lines) for what promises to be a lively conversation, offering insight into the lives and work of these four exceptional writers.
The 160th birthday of WB Yeats on June 13th is marked with a performance of Sailing to Byzantium, original songs set to 12 of Yeats’s poems, performed by Christine Toibin. Following a sell-out performance last year, Ruairi Conaghan returns with his one-man show Lies Where It Falls on June 19th.
Finally, on August 30th, HomePlace presents a storytelling brunch: Cloak of Wisdom, featuring Liz Weir, Vicky McParland and Anne Harper.
