SUNDAY TIMES EFG AWARD 2012 NOW OPEN!

It's back! The Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award is now open for entries for 2012.

£30,000 first prize! (Wasn't it a mere £25,000 in previous years?)

Stories may be previously unpublished, or first published/scheduled for publication after 1 January 2011.

All entries must be under 6,000 words and entirely original.

Closing date: 28th October.

And - yipee! - this year you can enter online. Thank God for that, says I.

More here.

The Floor Show - open mic

The Irish Writers’ Centre’s next open mic takes place this Sunday 28th August. If you would like to perform this month drop them a line to thefloorshowiwc@gmail.com and they will pop you onto the list. A great night of FREE entertainment!

MCGAHERN YEARBOOK 2011 REVIEW - Irish Times

Liam Harte reviews the McGahern Yearbook 2011 in today's Irish Times here. I have an essay in the book on the novel Amongst Women.

Harte quotes a line from my essay which says: 'Moran is not altogether unpleasant'. In the essay this sentence is preceded by five paragraphs explaining his deep unpleasantness, in case anyone should think that I am a fan of the bullying Moran. Here are the six paragraphs in question, just to balance things out a little:

"This book is about a man who, to my mind, never matured. Like a toddler, Moran wants to be the centre of attention, but only in the small kingdom of his immediate family. He is an awkward man; he delights in being contrary and difficult. Outsider are treated with suspicion and disdain.

One can only conclude that Moran is based on John McGahern’s own father, such are the similarities between the two men. In Memoir, McGahern refers to his father as a ‘violent and wilful’ person, devoid of a sense of humour, who ‘looked on any manifestation of enjoyment in others as a symptom of irresponsibility’ crucially because it diverted attention away from him: the king of the castle.

Moran is not a man for fun – levity is allowed into the house on his terms only. His daughters hide giddiness from him – they conceal their true personalities – especially when younger. And, early on, his new wife Rose, though she hardly knows Moran, instinctively does the same.

Money, and the supposed lack of it, is a constant source of concern for Moran. On a summer holiday in Strandhill, he sends his children door-to-door selling turf. He and Rose have a modest wedding at her family home because he does not want to squander money at the local hotel. Later, with the cost of his daughter’s wedding fresh in his mind, he attacks son-in-law Seán for not being ‘mature’ in his attitude to the importance of his pensionable civil service job.

We are to believe from the narrative that Moran’s personality stems from his disappointment after the way things panned out in the country after he had fought for independence. Surely, though, his depressed nature worsened after the death of his first wife, and his tendency towards lording it over people is long ingrained.

Moran is not altogether unpleasant, it must be said. He certainly has some welcome highs when he feels secure amongst his women. If he were analysed today he might be diagnosed as manic depressive: after the highs come the lows."

NEW POEM AT HUNGRY HILL

Listen by Ian Humphreys - image from Mill Cove Gallery

I have a new poem here at the Hungry Hill Anthology in response to Ian Humphreys's beautiful painting Listen.

After the Novel is Over

I have a new piece over at writing.ie on the blue feelings after finishing writing a novel.

A wee extract: 'For me, when the writing is going well, it makes me crazily happy; I get swallowed up in it and time flitters away like it never does when I am on kid duty. Having finished writing another novel this summer, I now realise that the long haul of novel writing suits me perfectly.' 

The rest of the article is here.

ARLEN HOUSE & NEW BLOGS

Sort of following on from my last post, the inimitable Arlen House have a new blog here where you can keep up-to-date on all their latest publishing and writerly news. They have posted a preview of the cover of Órfhlaith Foyle's short story collection Somewhere in Minnesota (above) which will be out in September, and also there's a look at the cover of the new expanded edition of To The World of Men, Welcome which will be out soon.

Órfhlaith will read at the Cork Short Story Festival on Wednesday the 14th of September at 9pm. She has also recently begun to blog and you can catch up with her here.

Do I sense a blog explosion? I hope so. There's only so much Twittermania I can handle. Give me the intimacy and info of blogging any day.

BOOK COVER ART

'Midnight Peacock' by Anni Betts

I came across an interesting article on cover design here by Roz Morris. She says: 'A good cover creates the sizzle that sells your book. It somehow, through a delightful alchemy of imagery and typography, tantalizes the right kind of readers and steers away the ones who won’t like what’s on the pages.'

Paintings often work well on poetry books whereas, nowadays, novels and short fiction mostly carry photographs as cover images. There are lots of headless ladies gracing the fronts of novels just now - who knows what that is all about?

As regards my covers, I've been lucky with the publishers I have been published by: three of them let me choose my own cover art (Arlen House, Salt and Salmon); one gave me a choice of images and I picked the same one they liked (New Island); Templar commissioned a witty image to go with the title poem; and Arlen House always kept me closely involved with cover art choices, one time using an image I had commissioned from a photo, another time using a sexy Pauline Bewick painting.

You form deep attachments with your covers; they are so familiar to you. It must be very hard when you hate the cover of the book you are trying to sell and promote.

'Gráinne Meets Queen Elizabeth, 1593' by Pat Jourdan

 
I own two of the paintings from my book covers and I bought prints of another two. There is something about owning the original art that makes it all tie in beautifully: the writing and the artwork. It makes you feel wrapped up in the whole thing. I'd give my eye teeth to own the Bewick painting that was on the cover of my short story collection To the World of Men, Welcome! (See below.)

Lovers and Feathers by Pauline Bewick

This is one of the paintings I own (below); it was on the cover of DIVAS! - A Sense of Place, an anthology I edited of women's writing from the west of Ireland, from Arlen House.

'Claddagh Basin with Long Walk' by Maura Flannery

I sourced the image for my forthcoming poetry book The Juno Charm but I have yet to see the cover and what Salmon have done with it. The poetry is full of moons, and the peacock is Juno's symbolic bird, so I googled something like 'peacock moon art' and found lots of images. The one I liked the best was Anni Betts's 'Midnight Peacock' - I love its delicacy, its blueness - so it is the image that will be on the cover. I am dying to see it on the actual book and to become as familiar with it as the artwork on all my other books.

NEW WILDE BOOK FROM GALWAY AUTHOR

11 August 17:10

Galway poet and teacher Gerard Hanberry's new biography of Oscar Wilde and his family, through seven generations, More Lives Than One is about to hit the shelves. Published by The Collins Press, it is available online from them at €24.99.

Gerry is a Salmon poet, At Grattan Road is his latest collection. He will be interviewed on Galway Bay FM this Friday morning the 12th August at around 11.30am.

Here's the blurb from the Collins Press site: "The story of Oscar Wilde and his extraordinary family is a remarkable one. His parents, the brilliant Sir William and the flamboyant Lady Jane, also led astonishing lives and experienced triumph and tragedy. His wife Constance Wilde had to change her name and live in exile until her death after his imprisonment. An epic family saga against a background of rebellion and famine, this has new revelations on Oscar’s time in prison, his father’s cover-up of his illegitimate daughters’ deaths and Oscar's mother’s dire poverty before her death. By linking the generations a more complete picture emerges of a brilliant Irishman whose tragic fall still breaks the reader’s heart."

Congrats Gerry!

I'M FEMINIST AND I'M PROUD

Today, at The Anti-Room, I have a mini-rant about people dissing the words 'feminism' and 'feminist'. Read it here.

STINGING FLY - NEW YORK STORIES

Going to the Chapel, New York

The Stinging Fly literary magazine is going to New York and they want to hear your New York stories. Their next issue will have a New York twist to it, and thanks to the support of Culture Ireland, they will launch it over there in October. The event is part of Imagine Ireland, the year-long celebration of Irish arts in America during 2011.

The New York issue will feature commissioned writing by Irish and American writers and will explore the relationship Irish people have had with the city over the years.

They have opened up a space on their site for people to share their New York stories and experiences. There are some stories already posted to the site, incuding beautifully written ones by Shauna Gilligan and Leona Lee Cully. I wrote about my wedding in New York and, at the moment, it's the last piece posted, so you need to scroll down to the bottom of the page here. Then go back up and read Shauna's, Leona's, Andrew's, Jeanne's, Martin's etc. etc.

FOUR YEAR BLOGOVERSARY

I'm having a funny few weeks. Edna O'Brien wrote a novel called August is a Wicked Month. I could write one called August is a Boring Month. I am at a loss having finished writing my new novel; I feel all crabby and impatient with the world. I have no gigs this month, therefore very little travel, and that makes me narky too. I love getting away - I don't live in the most culturally stimulating place. Which is grand when you are immersed in a project but, when you surface, there is a bit of a lack.

The month is book-ended by nice literary things - my novel You being dramatised on RTÉ Radio One for the first week of August was surreal and lovely. And I am going to a day-long workshop run by two wonderful writers on the last day of the month, but I am not doing much myself as such.

Of course I am still working; I have a short story collection to complete and it is nearly there and the themes in the stories interest me: mothers and sons, the loneliness of men and women, and the consequences of love. And I continue writing my articles for the Indo's Saturday mag too and they are fairly time consuming.

But I miss the urgency of the novel. Yes, 'urgency', a word I would normally only use about the short story. Writing the novel made me happy and sane because it obsessed and possessed me. When I wasn't writing it, I was thinking about it. It kept me busy and committed to the page, and those are two things I shrivel without.

But there are things to celebrate and give hope: I am back reading (and loving) short fiction after a bit of a hiatus; my house is cleaner than it has been in a year (!); and this week - Thursday - sees my four year blogoversary. Four years of rambling away to myself but finding, to my constant surprise, that people tune in. Since Facebook and Twitter have taken over the virtual world, less and less people bother with blogs. Certainly less people comment. But there are still readers and I know this because I meet them out and about, and they can tell me what I've been writing about here. Half the time I feel like I am wittering away to myself.

Blogging has been good to me: it has made me friends, introduced me to new writers, and gotten me gigs. Will I still be blogging in four year's time? Who knows? In the meantime thanks to all of you who read and comment; it helps when I'm having a wicked month to know you are out there, listening in.

FRANK O'CONNOR FEST BECOMES CORK INTL S/STORY FEST

Frank O'Connor Award shortlistee, Valerie Trueblood

The Frank O'Connor Festival has been re-named The Cork International Short Story Festival. This is the 12th year of the festival and it's in my top two - maybe even my top one - of lit fests.

They have a new website here and the programme for the festival is now up. Two friends of mine are reading at it, Órfhlaith Foyle and Kathleen Murray, along with a host of literary stars including Colm Tóibín and Edna O'Brien. English writer Clare Wigfall will give a four day masterclass. I am looking forward to meeting in person San Francisco-based Irish writer Ethel Rohan who I only know virtually so far. Ethel reads on the Friday with the lovely Alison MacLeod.

I am conducting a public interview with American writer and shortlistee for the Frank O'Connor Award, Valerie Trueblood, on the Friday at 3pm in The Ballroom of the Metropole Hotel. She is a wonderful writer and a lovely woman, so it is my honour and pleasure and I can't wait!