In Saturday’s Irish Times, Elaine Garvey tells Edel Coffey about the long road to her impressive debut novel, The Wardrobe Department. Omar El Akkad discusses his book critiquing the West’s response to the war in Gaza, One Day, Everyone Will Have Been Against This, with Sally Hayden. Fíona Scarlett talks about her second novel, May All Your Skies be Blue, with Niamh Donnelly. And there is a Q&A with Roisin Meaney about her new novel, Moving On.
Reviews are Oliver Farry on One Day, Everyone Will Have Been Against This by Omar El Akkad and The World after Gaza by Pankaj Mishra; Karlin Lillington on Source Code: My Beginnings by Bill Gates; Deirdre McQuillan on Textiles of Ireland: Archaeology, Craft, Art by Elizabeth Wincott Heckett; Claire Hennessy on the best new YA fiction; Michael Cronin on The City Changes Its Face by Eimear McBride; Alex Clark on Frogs for Watchdogs by Sean Farrell; Éilís Ní Dhuibhne on Three Days in June by Anne Tyler; Houman Barekat on The Wardrobe Department by Elaine Garvey; Julia Kelly on The Knowing by Madeleine Ryan; Edel Coffey on May All Your Skies be Blue by Fíona Scarlett; Pat Carty on The Vanishing Point by Paul Theroux; and Paschal Donohoe on Jonathan Sumption’s The Challenges of Democracy.
This weekend’s Irish Times Eason offer is The Trading Game by Gary Stevenson, just €6.99, a €6 saving.
Three Irish writers and a writer/illustrator have been longlisted for The Carnegies, Britain’s longest-running book awards for children and young people. They are unique in being judged by librarians, and 35 titles have been selected from 19 different publishers; 19 titles for the Carnegie Medal for Writing, and 16 for the Carnegie Medal for Illustration.
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CG Moore, who won the KPMG Children’s Books Ireland Book of the Year Award in 2022 for his verse novel, Gut Feelings, is longlisted for Trigger (Little Island Books), an unflinching novel written in verse about a teenage boy who is sexually assaulted in an attack he struggles to remember, which draws on the author’s own experience of trauma and recovery.
Marie-Louise Fitzpatrick, whose debut YA novel, On Midnight Beach, was shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal, is longlisted this year for Sisters of the Moon (Faber & Faber), which explores female friendship, creativity and our connection to the moon and its ethereal powers.
Kelly McCaughrain has been longlisted for the Medal for Writing for Little Bang, a bittersweet romance exploring teen pregnancy and a young woman’s right to choose her own future. Kelly’s debut, Flying Tips for Flightless Birds, won an unprecedented hat-trick of Children’s Books Ireland awards, as well as the Northern Ireland Book Award. She was the Children’s Writing Fellow for Northern Ireland, and works at Belfast Met College as educational support for young adults with special needs.
Oliver Jeffers, with Sam Winston, has made the Carnegie Medal for Illustration longlist for The Dictionary Story, a boundary-pushing celebration of the beauty of words featuring innovative interplays of typography and illustration.
The shortlists will be announced at London Book Fair on March 11th. The winners’ ceremony will be hosted at the Cambridge Theatre on June 19th. The winners will each receive a specially commissioned gold medal and a £5,000 Colin Mears Award cash prize.
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Caroline O’Donoghue’s novel The Rachel Incident is to be adapted for an eight-part TV series.
Commissioned by Channel 4, the series will be produced by the award-winning Element Pictures – producers of Normal People and Poor Things – and UCP, a division of Universal Studio Group and Pageboy. O’Donoghue has collaborated with Jen Statsky, co-creator of the hit series Hacks, to bring her characters to life on screen.
And Deadline reports that A Ladder to the Sky, the 2018 novel by John Boyne, is to be made into a feature film with two-time Emmy winner Johan Renck (Chernobyl) in talks to direct for production company Fifth Season. Edward Berger, who helped produce Oscar-nominated papal thriller Conclave, is said to be among the producers.
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As part of the UL Creative Writing Festival, April 9th to 12th, bestselling author Marian Keyes will be interviewed by festival founder and director, novelist Joseph O’Connor, at the University Concert Hall on April 10th. O’Connor’s 2025 The Ghosts of Rome has been an internationally acclaimed bestseller. Others appearing at the festival include Booker Prize winner Paul Lynch, international bestseller Liz Nugent, Pulitzer Prize winner and recently elected Saoi of Aosdána, Paul Muldoon, winner of the 2024 Irish Book of the Year Award, Donal Ryan, Limerick-born arts journalist and novelist Sarah Gilmartin, and many more, including European slam poetry champions and debut novelists from UL’s own MA in Creative Writing. Full details and booking at UCH.ie. Enquiries to joseph.oconnor@UL.ie
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Ennis Book Club Festival has announced the full programme for its 19th festival, which takes place from Friday to Sunday, March 7th to 9th, at various venues throughout the town and county. As always, the festival will offer opportunities to engage with your favourite authors and features an additional programme of events for younger readers.
Authors taking part include Ann Cleeves, Ian McEwan, Andrew O’Hagan, Sally Hayden, Rónán Hession, Cathy Sweeney, Patrick Holloway and Wendy Erskine. See ennisbookclubfestival.com for full details on all events.
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International Literature Festival Dublin, which takes place in May in Dublin’s Merrion Square Park, is seeking submissions for its Date With An Agent pitching event, which it runs in partnership with industry expert Vanessa Fox O’Loughlin, aka crime writer Sam Blake.
Ten emerging writers will have the opportunity to get tailored advice from top literary and screen agents from across all genres of publishing on Saturday, May 17th and on Friday, May 23rd, as part of the festival’s The Insider’s Guide to Publishing seminar. The deadline for applications is April 4th.
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The Women’s Prize Trust has announced the longlist for the second year of the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction, sponsored by Findmypast. Awarded for excellence, originality and accessibility in narrative non-fiction, it runs as a sister prize to the Women’s Prize for Fiction, which celebrates its 30th anniversary. The inaugural Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction in 2024 was won by Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World by Naomi Klein.
The music icon Neneh Cherry has been chosen alongside a newly elected member of parliament, Yuan Yang. Also on the longlist is the NHS palliative care doctor and writer, Rachel Clarke; two podcasters, Rebecca Nagle and Lulu Miller; a human rights lawyer, Harriet Wistrich; a political adviser, Chloe Dalton; and a marine biologist, Helen Scales. There are several celebrated established writers, including Pulitzer Prize winner Anne Applebaum, Jenni Fagan, Kate Summerscale and Alexis Wright. The award-winning biographer Sue Prideaux shares the stage with three acclaimed historians: Eleanor Barraclough, Helen Castor, and Clare Mulley. Six writers have been nominated for their debut non-fiction publication: Neneh Cherry, Chloe Dalton, Jenni Fagan, Lulu Miller, Rebecca Nagle and Yuan Yang.
Anne Applebaum’s Autocracy, Inc. uncovers the international networks that threaten democracy. Helen Scales’ What the Wild Sea Can Be provides an impassioned examination of the existential threat to our oceans. The stories behind 10 landmark legal cases in Harriet Wistrich’s Sister in Law receive a reappraisal, demonstrating the failure of the law when defending the female sex. Yuan Yang’s Private Revolutions is a portrait of modern China told through the lives of four ordinary women striving for equality. Rebecca Nagle’s By the Fire We Carry tells the story of the forced removal of Native Americans on to treaty lands, braiding it with a murder case from the 1990s.
Jenni Fagan’s Ootlin ruminates on life growing up in Scotland’s broken care system. Chloe Dalton’s Raising Hare portrays the improbable bond between a human and wild animal. Lulu Miller’s Why Fish Don’t Exist is a genre-bending personal journey, weaving history and science, that shows us how to embrace chaos. A Thousand Threads provides a behind-the-scenes dive into Neneh Cherry’s life as a famous musician, as well as an activist, daughter, mother and friend.
Eleanor Barraclough’s Embers of the Hands illuminates the Viking age through the everyday objects of common people. Helen Castor’s The Eagle and the Hart explores the power struggles of medieval England. Sue Prideaux’s Wild Thing re-examines a trailblazing, yet controversial post-Impressionist artist, casting new light from fresh research. Alexis Wright’s Tracker is a creative oral history that pieces together the life of an Aboriginal human rights champion. Clare Mulley’s Agent Zo is the previously untold story of a second World War female resistance fighter. Kate Summerscale takes on a infamous murderer from the 1950s in The Peepshow, providing new solutions to a well-known case. Rachel Clarke’s The Story of a Heart narrates a miraculous development in 20th-century medicine – the heart transplant.
The shortlist of six will be announced on March 26th and the winner of the £30,000 prize on June 12th.
To enter our competition to win every book on the longlist, click here.
