Please come and join me to celebrate Book Week NI in Lisburn Library on Oct 21.
Book your free ticket at: lisburnlibrary@librariesni.org.uk
BOOK WEEK NI
interview
The Worm Hole Podcast
Charlie Place discusses with me about my time writing stories for the BBC.
Please note there are two incredibly mild swear words in this episode.
Interviewing Kit de Waal for Cork World Book Fest
The Best of Everything: Kit de Waal in conversation with Paul McVeigh.
Award-winning writer Kit de Waal in conversation with Paul McVeigh on her latest novel The Best of Everything which is released this month, April 2025.
Kit de Waal, born to an Irish mother and Caribbean father, was brought up among
the Irish community of Birmingham in the ‘60s and ‘70s.
Her debut novel My Name Is Leon was an international bestseller, shortlisted for the
Costa First Novel Award, longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize and won the Kerry
Group Irish Novel of the Year Award for 2017. In 2022 it was adapted for television
by the BBC. It is now on the GCSE curriculum for schools.
Paul McVeigh’s short stories have been in anthologies, journals and newspapers, and read on BBC Radio 3, 4 and 5, RTE Radio, as well as Sky ARTS. He co-founded London Short Story Festival and has edited three anthologies.
Sunday 27 April 2025
River Lee Hotel | 3pm | Free – booking essential
Interviewing Lisa Harding & Kathleen Murray In Cork
Beautiful, Wilful & Adrift: Kathleen Murray and Lisa Harding. In conversation with Paul McVeigh.
If John Irving had been born in Carlow, he would have written The Deadwood Encore by Kathleen Murray. There are similarities in Murray’s tragicomedy, her colourful players, her celebration of the heroism involved in fraternal love. There’s so much here to delight in–fizzing dialogue, offbeat characters, flights of fancy and mad escapades… Kathleen has the guts to take on what’s miraculous and eerie, and spins Frank’s story shrewdly, irreverently, and fondly. A brilliant debut.’
‘Gothic and gloriously entertaining, Lisa Harding’s third novel arrives to fill the Secret History-shaped hole in your lives. Wilde is an elite university in Dublin, full of bright young people who talk about poetry and arthouse cinema, act in plays and have turbulent affairs. Jessica and Linda, friends since childhood, are immediately swept up by the glamour and romance. But then Linda meets Mark, a darkly enigmatic figure, and soon tragedy strikes.’ (The Guardian)
Saturday 26 April 2025
Triskel | 7pm | €5
Booking: https://triskelarts.ticketsolve.com/shows/873653553/events
Short Forms in the Global Literary Marketplace Symposium
I’m honoured to be attending the Short Forms in the Global Literary Marketplace Symposium on April 7.
The event is at the Queen Mary University of London, Mile Ed Campus, 2.45 – 4.05.
Panel 4 – The literary marketplace (chair: Rehana Ahmed)
I’ll be joining…
- Sana Goyal, editor and publishing director of Wasafiri
- Kristen Vida Alfaro, publisher and director of Tilted Axis Press
- Ellah Wakatama Allfrey, chair of the Caine Prize for African Writing and editor-at-large at Canongate Books
London Launch of I Hear You at Word Factory
Tickets are selling fast for the London launch if ‘I Hear You’ at The Word Factory on March 21st. This will be a wonderful chance to celebrate with friends, old and new, and I’ll be back to my short story home. It has been too long. Thrilled that the brilliant Kit de Waal will be reading and leading a literary conversation with me.
The launch is at the beautiful Georgian venue, Bloomsbury’s Music Room. Hope to see you there and details – including how to pre-order a copy of the book – here.
*PLEASE NOTE BOOKS ARE AVAILABLE ON THE NIGHT BY CASH ONLY*
Reading at The Outing Festival
I’ll be visiting The Outing Festival at the Inn at Dromoland, Co. Clare, Ireland.
I’ll be reading from The Good Son and talking to Kitty Murphy on Saturday 15th February.
“An LGBT+ Weekend like no other!” The Outing Festival is a fusion of music, comedy, ceilí bands, queer arts, and the best of Ireland’s and International performers, drag artists and DJs plus so much more for over 10 Years”
Interviewing Martina Devlin
The Black Box
Wednesday 15 January, 1.00pm
Doors 12.30 | Unreserved seating
£12:00 including lunch
Tickets
“Charlotte Brontë, who dazzled the world with some of literature’s most vital and richly-drawn characters, spent her brief but extraordinary life in search of love. She eventually found it with Arthur Bell, a reserved yet passionate Irishman. After marrying, the pair honeymooned in Ireland – a glimmer of happiness in a life shadowed by tragedy.
That moment of joy was destined to be short-lived however, as Brontë died just nine months into their marriage. Her genius, and the aura of mystery surrounding her, meant she’d been mythologised even within her own lifetime – a process which only intensified after her death.
Observed through the eyes of Mary Nicholls – who encountered Charlotte on that fateful journey to Ireland, and who went on to wed her widower Arthur –Charlotte is a story of three lives irrevocably intertwined. Bound by passion and obsession, friendship and loss, loyalty and deception – this a story of Brontë’s short but pivotal time in Ireland as never before told.
Martina Devlin’s enthralling new novel Charlotte weaves back and forth through Charlotte’s life, reflecting on the myths built around her by those who knew her, those who thought they knew her, and those who longed to know her. Above all, this is a story of fiction: who creates it, who lives it, who owns it.
‘Charlotte is elegant and sophisticated but also completely gripping. Martina Devlin brilliantly creates the world around this iconic writer, with characters who have the power to surprise and compel. I loved it.’ Emily Hourican
‘In Charlotte, the raw gold of Charlotte Brontë’s marriage to Arthur Nicholls has been wrought in a wonderful artefact; this is a beautiful novel full of mystery, intrigue and story.’ Carlo Gébler
‘A powerful and compelling novel that expertly imagines the lives and times of those closest to Brontë, and captivates the reader with its cleverness and eloquence.’ Mary Costello
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Martina Devlin has written novels, plays and short stories. She has won the Royal Society of Literature’s V.S. Pritchett Prize, a Hennessy Literary Award, and been shortlisted three times for the Irish Book Awards.
She writes a weekly current affairs column for the Irish Independent for which she has won a number of prizes, including National Newspapers of Ireland commentator of the year. She holds a PhD in literary practice from Trinity College Dublin.”
Interviewing Donal Ryan
Heart, Be At Peace: Donal Ryan in conversation with Paul McVeigh
Donal Ryan has rapidly become one of Irelands most celebrated authors. Join Donal as he talks about his new book, Heart, Be at Peace, and his career, with author Paul McVeigh.
Donal Ryan, from Nenagh, Co. Tipperary, is the author of six number one-bestselling novels and a short story collection. He has won several awards for his fiction, including the European Union Prize for Literature, the Guardian First Book Award and four Irish Book Awards, and has been shortlisted for several more, including the Costa Book Award and the Dublin International Literary Award. He was nominated for the Booker Prize in 2013 for his debut novel, The Spinning Heart, and again in 2018, for his fourth novel, From A Low and Quiet Sea. In 2016 his debut novel, The Spinning Heart, was voted Irish Book of the Decade. In 2021 he became the first Irish writer to be awarded the Jean Monnet Prize for European Literature. His work has been adapted for stage and screen and translated into over twenty languages. A law graduate and former civil servant, Donal has lectured in Creative Writing at the University of Limerick since 2014 and lives in Castletroy with his wife Anne Marie and their two children. His seventh novel, Heart, Be At Peace, will be published worldwide in August 2024.
Paul McVeigh’s debut novel, The Good Son, won The Polari First Novel Prize, The McCrea Literary Award and was shortlisted for many others including the Prix de Roman Cezam. His short stories have appeared in numerous anthologies, journals and newspapers, as well as, on BBC Radio 3, 4 & 5, and Sky Arts. He edited the Queer Love anthology and The 32: An Anthology of Irish Working Class Voices. His writing has been translated into seven languages.
His collection of short stories written for BBC Radio, I Hear You, will be published by Salt Publishing in March 2025.
| Date | Wednesday October 16th |
| Venue | Rathfarnham Castle |
| Admission | €10 / €8 |
| Time | 7pm |
Reading at Féile an Phobail, 9 August
SCRIBES AT THE DUNCAIRN
DUNCAIRN ARTS CENTRE, DUNCAIRN AVENUE
Doors open 6:30pm
Featuring Paul McVeigh, Bernie McGill & Jan Carson
Paul McVeigh’s short stories have been in numerous anthologies including ‘Being Various’, ‘The Art of the Glimpse’ and ‘Common People’. They have also been printed in ‘The London Magazine’, ‘The Stinging Fly’ and ‘The Irish Times’, on radio at BBC Radio 3, 4, 5; RTE 1, and on Sky TV. His ten-part short story series, ‘The Circus’, appeared on BBC Radio 4 in 2023. Paul co-founded the London Short Story Festival and is associate director of Word Factory, ‘the UK’s national organisation for excellence in the short story’ The Guardian. Paul’s debut novel, ‘The Good Son’, won The McCrea Literary Award and The Polari First Novel Prize. His writing has been translated into seven languages.
Bernie McGill is the 2023 winner of the Edge Hill Short Story Prize for her collection This Train is For (No Alibis Press). She is the author of two novels: The Watch House (nominated for the Ireland European Union Prize for Literature in 2019) and The Butterfly Cabinet (2010) and of one further short story collection, Sleepwalkers (2013). Her work has appeared in a number of anthologies and has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4. Bernie works as a Mentor for the Irish Writers’ Centre and is an Associate Fellow with the Royal Literary Fund.
Jan Carson’s critically acclaimed writings explore themes related to identity, place and belonging, but also to angst and alienation, in such works as The Fire Starters (winner EU Prize for Literature, 2019) and The Raptures. She is also very funny! About her latest collection of short stories, Quickly, While They Still Have Horses, the Irish Times said: ‘Long after the reader has closed the book, these tales linger in the mind: vivid, original and moving.’
Chaired by Marnie Kennedy, Shared Reading facilitator. This event is hosted by
Stories@theDuncairn, a volunteer-led, community literary project, in partnership with
the Greater New Lodge Community Festival and Féile an Phobail. Café at the Duncairn
open for tea, coffee and refreshments. Wine Reception. All welcome!
SCRÍOBHAITHE AG IONAD DHÚN CAIRN
IONAD EALAÍON DHÚN CAIRN, ASCAILL DHÚN CAIRN
Oscaíltear na doirse ag 6:30i.n
Beidh Paul McVeigh, Bernie McGill & Jan Carson ag glacadh páirte ann
Bhí gearrscéalta Paul McVeigh ina lán duanairí, ina measc, ‘Being Various’, ‘The Art of the Glimpse’ agus ‘Common People’. Bhí siad clóite in ‘The London Magazine’, in ‘The Stinging Fly’ agus san ‘The Irish Times’, ar an raidió ar BBC 3, 4, 5; RTE 1, agus Sky TV chomh maith. Bhí a shraith gearrscéalta dheich gcuid ‘The Circus’ ar BBC Radio 4 in 2023. Chomhbhunaigh Paul Féile Gearrscéalta Londan agus is stiúrthóir comhlach Word Factory é, ‘the UK’s national organisation for excellence in the short story’ The Guardian. Bhain an chéad úrscéal ag Paul, ‘The Good Son’, Duais Litríochta McCrea agus Duais Polari don Chéad Úrscéal. Tá a chuid scríbhneoireachta aistrithe i seacht dteanga.
Is buaiteoir Duais Gearrscéalta Edge Hill 2023 í Bernie McGill dá bailiúchán This Train is For (No Alibis Press). Is údar dhá úrscéal í: ‘The Watch House’ (a bhí ainmnithe do Dhuais Litríochta na hÉireann an Aontais Eorpaigh in 2019) agus ‘The Butterfly Cabinet’ (2010) agus bailiúchán gearrscéalta eile, ‘Sleepwalkers’ (2013). Bhí a saothaoir ina lán duanairí, agus bhí siad craolta ar BBC Radio 3 agus ar
Radio 4. Oibríonn Bernie mar Mheantóir d’Ionad Scríbhneoirí na hÉireann agus is Comhalta Comhlach leis an Chiste Litríochta Ríoga í.
Pléann scríbhneoireachtaí Jan Carson, a fuair moladh ó na léirmheastóirí, téamaí a bhaineann le féiniúlacht, le háiteanna, le muintearas, ach le himní agus le coimhthíos chomh maith, i saothair dá cuid amhail The Fire Starters (buaiteoir Dhuais Litríochta an AE, 2019) agus The Raptures. Bíonn sí iontach greannmhar fosta! Mhaígh an Irish Timesfaoina bailiúchán gearrscéalta is déanaí, Quickly, While They Still Have Horses: ‘Long after the reader has closed the book, these tales linger in the mind: vivid, original and moving.’
Beidh Marnie Kennedy, Éascaitheoir Léitheoireachta Roinnte, ina cathaoirleach air.
Beidh an t-imeacht seo arna óstáil ag Stories@theDuncairn, tionscadal litríochta pobail
atá á threorú ag saorálaithe, i gcomhar le Féile Pobail Mhórcheantar an Lóiste Úir agus
Féile an Phobail. Beidh an Café in Ionad Dhún Cairn oscailte agus beidh tae, caife agus
sólaistí ar fáil. Fáiltiú Fíona. Beidh fáilte roimh chách!
Paul McVeigh 