January Over The Edge: Open Reading as Over The Edge Celebrates Fifteenth Birthday with reading by Martina Evans, Edna Faye Kiel, & Nicola Geddes

The January ‘Over The Edge: Open Reading’ takes place in Galway City Library on Thursday, January 18^th, 6.30-8.00pm. The Featured Readers are Nicola Geddes, Edna Faye Kiel, & Martina Evans. This reading marks the fifteenth anniversary of the first Over The Edge reading in Galway City Library. 

Originally from Scotland, Nicola Geddes studied Environmental Art at the Glasgow School of Art, and Cello Performance at the London College of Music. She has been based in County Galway for the past twenty five years, where she works as a cellist and music tutor. To date her poetry has been published in Crannog, the Galway Review, and Skylight 47. In 2017 Nicola’s poems received a Special Commendation from the Patrick Kavanagh Award. 

Edna Faye Kiel has lived in Killaspuglonane, County Clare for many years but is originally from the United States. She writes fiction and has been a participant in both the North Clare Writers’ Workshop and Susan Millar DuMars’ advanced fiction writing classes. Edna’s work has been published in The Stoney Thursday Book, Stinging Fly, Books Ireland, The Cuirt Journal, and inCognito in Ireland; in Rosebud  and Ellipsis in the U.S.; London Magazine and Staple:New Writing in the U.K.; Jaam Tracks and Takahe in New Zealand; and imago and Famous Reporter in Australia. Edna is married to the poet Knute Skinner. In 2017 she was shortlisted for 2017 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year.

Martina Evans

Martina Evans was born in 1961, the youngest of ten children, and grew up in County Cork in a country pub, shop and petrol station. After training as a radiographer in Dublin she moved to London in 1988. Her first collection of poems, The Inniscarra Bar and Cycle Rest, appeared in 1995 and was followed by three further collections, All Alcoholics are Charmers (1998), Can Dentists Be Trusted? (2004) and Facing the Public (2009). She teaches Creative Writing at the City Literary Institute and Birkbeck College. She is also the author of three novels: Midnight Feast (1996), The Glass Mountain (1997), No Drinking No Dancing No Doctors (2000) and the prose-poem/novella Petrol (2012). The Windows of Graceland: New& Selected Poems was published by Carcanet, to wide critical and popular acclaim, in 2016; Martina’s next collection of poems Now We Can Talk Openly About Men will be out from Carcanet in May. She lives in London with her daughter.

As usual there will be an open-mic after the Featured Readers have finished. New readers are always especially welcome. The MC for the evening will be Susan Millar DuMars. For further details phone 087-6431748.

Over The Edge acknowledges the ongoing generous financial support of Galway City Council, Poetry Ireland, & The Arts Council. 

N.B. we were delighted to learn just before Christmas that Over The Edge is to receive a more than 20% increase in its Arts Council funding for 2018, our highest level of funding ever. Happy New Year!  

January Over The Edge: Open Reading with Tim Sniffen, Helena Kilty, & Vinny Steed

The January ‘Over The Edge: Open Reading’ takes place in Galway City Library on Thursday, January 19^th, 6.30-8.00pm. The Featured Readers are Vinny Steed, Helena Kilty, & Tim Sniffen. This reading marks the fourteenth anniversary of the first Over The Edge reading in Galway City Library.

Tim Sniffen

Vinny Steed has had work published abroad and at home.  His poems have featured in the Galway Review, Headstuff, Skylight 47, Crannóg, Into the Void, Tales from the Forest magazine and in the upcoming Ofi Press magazine in February.  He was long listed for the 2015 & 2016 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year competition and short listed for the 2016 Doolin poetry competition.  One of his poems was recently nominated by Into the Void for the Pushcart Prize.  He attends poetry workshops in the Galway Arts Centre.

Helena Kilty lives in Galway, where she divides her time between writing and working as a psychotherapist. She’s currently completing a collection of short stories. She also writes non-fiction and poetry. She’s a member of the Galway Writers’ Workshop and completed the MA in writing at NUI Galway in 2012. Her work has been published in Surge: New Writing From Ireland (O’Brien Press), Skylight47, Crannóg, Poems in profile and in the Abandoned Darlings anthology.

Tim Sniffen studied writing and animation at Hampshire College and began working with Chicago’s Second City theater in 2003: credits there include The Second City Guide To The Opera, Death of a Streetcar Named Virginia Woolf and the recent Longer! Louder! Wagner! -- The Second City Wagner Companion, because who doesn’t like taking a few jabs at Hitler’s favourite easy-listening music? Tim has written for McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, National Public Radio and keeps his own Tumblr site for things that everyone else refuses to print. You can find him as MisterSniffen on Twitter for jokes and the occasional David Versus Goliath squabble with airlines and movie theaters.

As usual there will be an open-mic after the Featured Readers have finished. New readers are always most welcome. The MC for the evening will be Susan Millar DuMars. For further details phone 087-6431748.

Over The Edge acknowledges the ongoing generous financial support of Galway City Council, Poetry Ireland, & The Arts Council.