2017 Over The Edge New Writer of Year SHORTLIST

2017 OVER THE EDGE

NEW WRITER OF THE YEAR

SHORTLIST

FICTION

Teresa Sweeney, Galway, ‘Stars’

Una Mannion, Sligo, ‘Dogwood’

Niamh MacCabe, Leitrim, ‘Steer’, ‘Memorise’, ‘Dark’

David O’Dwyer, Dublin ‘The Empty’

Niall Bourke, London ‘The Hands’

Gerard McKeown, London ‘Sisters’

Edna Faye Kiel, Clare, ‘Circles’

Edel Burke, Mayo, ‘One’

Barbara Lovric, Kerry, ‘Commitment’

Kathryn Burke, Dublin, ‘The Depth’, ‘A Legacy’

Micheál Ó’Síocháin, Cork ‘A Day In’

Paula Conway, East Sussex, ‘The Chalk’

P.J. Moore, Galway ‘Thick’

James Finlan, Galway, ‘The Gospel’

Maeve Mulrennan, Galway, ‘End of’

Richard Newton, Hampshire, ‘Loose’

Edna Faye Kiel, Clare, ‘Circles’

Angela Victory, Galway, ‘Aussie’

POETRY

James Anthony, Athlone

Sarah Padden, Galway

Ursula Shields-Huemer, Galway

Alyn Fenn, Cork

Julie Irigaray, France

Anne Walsh Donnelly, Mayo

Roisin Browne, Dublin

Caroline Am Bergris, London

Emily V, North Dakota

Connie Masterson, Galway

Jean Tuomey, Mayo

Colin Dardis, Belfast

Evan Costigan, Kildare

Morag Anderson, Scotland

Stephanie Brennan, Galway

Caroline Bracken, Wicklow

Kathryn Guille, Limerick

Ruth Aylett, Scotland

Christine Valters-Paintner, Galway

Art Ó Súilleabháin, Galway

Jo Burns, Germany

Simon Murphy, Bristol

Chris Jenkins, Belfast

Nollaig Rowan, Dublin

Lauren Garland, London

Flish McCarthy, Galway

Bogusia Wardein, Norway

Audrey Molloy, Australia

Aidan Hynes, Dublin,

Karin Molde, Germany

Patrick Holloway, Brazil

Sighle Meehan, Galway

Steve Fraser, Scotland

We would like to thank our competition sponsors: 

Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop, Dock No. 1, Ward’s Hotel, 

Clare Daly TD, Kenny’s Bookshop 

& Senator Trevor Ó’Clochartaigh 

We would also like to thank this year's competition judge, Nicki Griffin

 

The longlist can be read here. 

 THE WINNERS WILL BE ANNOUNCED   @

The October Over The Edge: Open Reading

on Thursday, October 26^th 

Galway City Library, 6.30-8pm

September Over The Edge: Open Reading with Oisín Fagan, Paul Denby, & Dara O'Foghlu

The September ‘Over The Edge: Open Reading’ takes place in Galway City Library on Thursday, September 28th, 6.30-8.00pm. The Featured Readers are Oisín Fagan, Paul Denby, & Dara O Foghlu. The evening will also see the announcement of the shortlist for this year’s Over The Edge New Writer of the Year competition, judged by writer, poet, and Skylight 47 editor Nicki Griffin.

A native of Galway, Dara O Foghlu graduated from the Writing MA in NUI Galway in 2008. He has published his fiction in Ropes as well as in three collections of short stories with The Atlantis Collective, which were launched as part of the Cúirt festival. He has been a freelance editor for seven years, and has recently returned from Vietnam where he was editing state propaganda for the Communists. 

Paul Denby  has been in Galway since 2005, having previously lived in England and Germany. He studied Mathematics and Economics, and works as a Software Engineer. Paul participates in poetry workshops at the Galway Arts Centre and was longlisted for the 2016 ‘Over the Edge’ New Writer of the Year Competition.

Oisín Fagan

Oisín Fagan is a fiction writer and activist. He does work with the Irish Housing Network, and spends much of his time outside his job as a language teacher campaigning on social issues.  He stories has previously been published in The Stinging Fly, New Planet Cabaret and Young Irelanders and his work has featured at the Irish Museum of Modern Art. Earlier this year he won the inaugural Penny Dreadful Novella Prize for The Hierophants. Hostages, his first collection of short stories, was published in 2016 by New Island.

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.

Over The Edge Culture Night Open-Mic at Kenny’s Bookshop & Gallery

Over The Edge is holding two special Culture Night open-mics - one for fiction writers, the other for poets - with prizes for the best readers, at Kennys Bookshop and Gallery in Liosbán Retail Park on Friday, September 22nd.

The open-mic for fiction writers starts at 3.30pm. Participants should bring along two pages of a story to read. The reading will include a guest appearance from Kevin Doyle who will be reading from his recently published short story collection Do You Like Oranges?

Kevin Doyle

The open-mic for poets starts at 5.45pm. Participants should bring along two poems to read. The reading will include guest appearances from Australian poets Catherine Bateson and Jane Williams. 

Catherine Bateson

The evening will be MC’d by Kevin Higgins and both open-mics will feature readings from their long-listed stories and poems by some of the writers on the long list for the 2017 Over The Edge New Writer of The Year competition, for which Kenny’s is one of the sponsors.

This reading is open to all. If you have a poem or story you want to share, come along.

About our special guests: 

Kevin Doyle won the Michael McLaverty Short Story Award in 2016, in the same year his eBook collection Do You Like Oranges? won top prize in Ireland’s inaugural ‘indie’ book awards, The Carousel Book Awards. The Worms That Saved The World, an illustrated kids book about a community of earthworm who fight to save their home from a luxury golf course was published in May; Noam Chomsky has described the book as ‘charming’.  His short stories have been published in Cork Literary Review, Stinging Fly, Southwords, Burning Bush, Cúirt Journal, Duality, Liblit and Sunday Tribune.  His work has also been included in anthologies such as Irish Writers Against War (Dublin, 2003), Pulse Fiction (London, 1998) and Snapshots (London, 1999) as well as Cork millennium collection, An Gob Saor.  He has been shortlisted for many prizes (including Over The Edge, 2010) and has won top placings in the Ian St James Short Story Award, Kilkenny Prize, Tipperary Short Story Weekend Prize and the Highlands and Islands Short Story Award.  His work was described by the late Patrick Galvin as ‘terse and original’.  He blogs regularly on Irish and radical politics at http://www.kfdoyle.wordpress.com  . He has read on a number of occasions at the Frank O’Connor International Festival of the Short Story.

Catherine Bateson is an award-winning poet and writer for children and young adults. She has three poetry collections published, including, Marriage for Beginners, John Leonard Press, 2009. She has also had three verse novels for young adults published with University of Queensland Press. Her poetry has been widely anthologised. She has also published over a dozen books for children and young adults and twice won the Children’s Book Council of Australia’s Book of the Year, Younger Readers. Her latest book for young adults, Lisette’s Paris Notebook was published early in 2017 by Allen & Unwin.  She is currently working on both a new poetry collection and a new book for younger readers. Catherine has taught creative writing for the past thirteen years, and has been a guest writer at many schools. Her work has been read on radio and featured on television. She has also appeared at various poetry and writers festivals throughout Australia.

Jane Williams

Jane Williams was born in England in 1964 to an Irish father and Australian mother. She lives in Tasmania, Australia. Since the early 1990s her poems have been published in most major Australian literary journals and newspapers, in anthologies, and online in countries including Ireland, USA, Canada, England, Japan, Sweden and India. She has been a featured reader at reading venues and festivals around Australia and in Ireland, England, Canada, USA, Malaysia, Czech Republic and Slovakia where she held a three month residency at the Bridge Guard Residency in Sturovo in 2016. She has a Masters in Creative Writing from Canberra University. Jane has published six collections of poetry, most recently 2013 Days Like These - selected and new poems, published by Interactive Press.

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

Autumn Beginners & Intermediate Creative Writing Classes at Galway Technical Institute BOOK YOUR PLACE NOW

Creative Writing for Beginners with Kevin Higgins takes place one evening per week (Monday) from 7-9pm (10 weeks) with a mid-term break. It commences on Monday, October 2^nd, 2017. Advance booking is essential. Places cost €120. Kevin Higgins will provide writing exercises for, and give gentle critical feedback to, those interested in trying their hand at writing stories, poems, or memoir.

To book a place, go to http://www.gti.ie/parttime/course/detail/t/77/c/201705-005096

Susan Millar DuMars & Kevin Higgins

Intermediate Creative Writing with Susan Millar DuMars takes place one evening per week (Tuesday) from 7-9pm (10 weeks) with a mid-term break. It commences on Tuesday, October 3^rd, 2017. Advance booking is essential. Places cost €120. This class is suitable for those who’ve participated in creative writing classes before or begun to have work published in magazines. Flexible exercises and work-shopping of assignments, together with the study of the works of published writers, will help each class member to find their own writing voice.

To book a place, go to http://www.gti.ie/parttime/course/detail/t/77/c/201705-005108

YOU CAN ALSO BOOK in person at Galway Technical Institute, Monday-Friday, (10am-4.30pm) when GTI re-opens after the Summer break in late August.

For further information contact Galway Technical Institute, Father Griffin Road, Galway, phone 091-581342 or email gtiadulted@gretb.ie or see http://www.gti.ie