Writing & Me

FINDING NANCY By Frances Mulcahy

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 12:41:00 +0100

The story:
Ireland 1921
Four year old Nancy sits high on her brother Michael’s shoulders as he makes his way down Spring Garden Alley toward Waterford Quay to board the ship ‘Orsova’. He’s a sailor but he’ll not be working on this ship but will board as an emigrant passenger bound for the distant land of Australia. It’s a life changing decision but he didn’t make it alone, Nancy and the rest of their family plan to follow him in the near future. Household conversation has revolved aro...

Born of Blood, SB Knight

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 10:51:54 +0100

Why Dark Fantasy? I’ve asked myself this question a number of times and, to be honest, I do not have a good answer. In my opinion, writing is like a relationship. You try out different genres and, like relationships, sometimes they work and sometimes they fall flat. What I find interesting is that I didn’t gravitate to Dark Fantasy; rather, Dark Fantasy searched me out. I was discussing a very popular series of vampire books with my wife while watching a show on the History Channel about the ...

Mandy James: Righteous Exposure

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 23:09:54 +0100

But around ten years ago I decide to have a bash. My family had read some of my more recent stuff and said I had talent. Still unsure I wrote my first novel and a few short stories and sent them off to various agents and publishers. They were all rejected. Those early rejections were just soul destroying. Because I hadn’t much confidence to start with re- writing I nearly gave up. But I read writing tips and listened to advice and slowly I began to improve. The main thing I tended to get wrong ...

Where I Write by Heron's Flood Author Evelyn Walsh

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 21:13:10 +0100

At the weekends I will sit propped up in bed for an hour or so and write before I rise. If I get up and dressed suddenly all sorts of ridiculous domestic trivia seems to get in my way (I'm lying - it is called procrastinating!). On my 'writing day' - the unpaid day I have stolen for myself from the working week I head to one of the many libraries in Fingal (I especially like Rush) and read and write there for three or four hours. This morning I spent in Fighting Words and now I will write...

Finding a Literary Agent by Louise Hall

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 20:21:31 +0100

I came across a website of an agency based in America and immediately thought, “Well that won’t work”. However, on reading through the website, I discovered that the agency represented Irish writers. Spotting that someone as reputable as P.R. Guru, Terry Prone, was one of the agency’s clients, gave me the confidence to direct myself to the submissions page.

I sent a query email including a synopsis of the unfinished novel to the email address listed. Two weeks later, I received a reply f...

Titanic. Poetry in Triplicism by James Fitzpatrick

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 09:05:41 +0100

Story line

Titanic revolves around a conversation between SO or SM ‘Lightoller’, the highest ranking surviving officer, and Millvina Dean, a two month old at the time of the sinking. She was steerage, which is third class, and was saved in a bundle of cloth. She had no memory of the sinking. 66% of all third class children drowned. In the poem ‘Lightoller’ tells Millvina what happened and what he came across on his final Deck Inspection. This took place at 10p.m. ...

Timmy Conway - Mam

Thu, 15 Dec 2011 20:54:21 +0100

Mam, who began life as Mary MacNamara, was born in 1916 into a farming family in West Clare. Her mother was a teacher and her siblings were high-achievers. One became a priest, while two others served as a doctor and dentist respectively in the British forces during the Second World War. Unfortunately, Mam did not do well at school – she was highly intelligent but suffered from what is now known as dyslexia. So a possible career as a teacher was closed to her. Her mother arranged for her to ent...

Conor O'Reilly - If I Had a Minute to Spare

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 15:55:32 +0100

The blog that I write doesn’t really serve any function other than as a space for me to write regularly. I write about anything and everything, and I try to post at least once a week. Many of my posts are long, personal, prone to ramble, irrelevant, and poorly punctuated. That’s beside the point; I write a lot and the hit count on my blog stats keeps pulling me back. Knowing that someone is reading is one of my main motivations for keeping it up.

Like any blog, it requires time to grow. Sur...

Rioghnach Ní Ghrioghair - Engage Programme

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 09:59:48 +0100

In April, the first of the workshops commenced. A brief speed-dating style session of a meet-and-greet commenced and ended in thirty minutes before we were hastily sectioned into groups to begin rigorous pitching sessions. I hate those kinds of things, especially being put under pressure/put on the spot and having to introduce who you are, explain your work and participation in a programme that has so many young and talented, very hard-working and very inspirational filmmakers involved. I was ove...

Someone Has To Pay - Joe McCoubrey

Mon, 14 Nov 2011 15:58:42 +0100

After schooldays I found a great outlet for writing through my local newspaper where I was later to become Editor. Those first days, when I reported on my own football team’s activities before progressing to a general sports role, and eventually into college to learn the art of journalism, were the best I can remember. What strikes me most about those days is that this mad urge to write needed to be tempered by my need to learn how to do it in a way that would touch a chord with readers...

First Kill - P.J Callaghan

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 10:54:30 +0100

Like my lead character Linda Garcia I had learned much just being exposed to an aviation environment and flying as a passenger in a light aircraft. I wondered at the time did I know enough to fly the aircraft by myself if I absolutely had to. This led to a young fertile mind inventing a life and death scenario from which I could only escape in one of these aircraft; had I learned enough to succeed? This was almost certainly when the seeds of my novel, First Kill, were sown and was the nuc...

The Heron's Flood - Evelyn Walsh

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 15:45:08 +0100

My husband (my blog’s Jemser) http://ev-allthisandheaventoo.blogspot.com/ ) could not get over my readiness to show my writing to all and sundry. My normal fear of being ‘not good enough’ disappeared when it came to writing. I didn’t care what people thought. I had found my voice and by God I was going to use it, not to do so would have been a sin-against myself anyway!

I was lucky, every competition I entered I was either long listed, shortlisted or got an honourable mention – s...

Arthur Quinn and the World Serpent - Alan Early

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 14:31:47 +0100

I’d always written a lot; short stories growing up and then short films during my days at the National Film School. I even wrote another children’s novel when I was sixteen (give or take). It was rambling and messy but had a few ideas I still like. It also had a telepathic fish. Naturally. Someone asked me recently if writing ‘Arthur Quinn and the World Serpent’ was a daunting task. And I can honestly say that it wasn’t. I knew I could finish the story – I’d written that length alre...

Me Father was a Hero and Me Mother was a Saint - Eamonn Sheridan

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 15:32:45 +0100

But it wasn't until I attended a B.A. course at the age of fifty that I finally found the confidence to actually get down to writing. It followed remarks made by the Senior Lecturer one evening. He said "We should do what we can to leave a legacy of some sort so that we'll be remembered when we die, and what better way to do this than to write a book." That very evening I began to do my research and compile the information needed to do just that.

I watched my mother struggle to bring up her ver...

The Moth - Rebecca O'Connor

Wed, 14 Sep 2011 11:47:49 +0100

We wanted to get away from the stuffy and intimidating corridors of academia too much associated with ‘literary journals’ and to do away with this idea that what was popular or commercial must therefore be dumbed down. The Moth publishes literature and fine art – and makes no bones about it. And yet one of the first people to contact us to say how much they liked the magazine was not an academic or an artist or a published writer, but a woman who’d bought a copy in her local newsagent bec...

The L.A Commandments - Gillian Duffy

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 14:25:04 +0100

Working on my first novel, The L.A. Commandments, was probably the most excited I’ve ever been when writing. It was all new to me - a novel adventure! – and the fact that I was now going to bring the figments of my imagination to life, in a sense, was like nothing I’d experienced before; it’s a type of creative freedom that’s liberating. Once the story began, the development of characters and their interactions was something that gave me great satisfaction. Choosing settings, fi...

Writing and Me - Write Something!

Wed, 17 Aug 2011 20:23:35 +0100

Since our individual writing projects at the moment are so different (Muireann is working on a novel as well as a number of short stories while Sarah is writing a history PhD), we wanted to make Write Something! as inclusive as possible. There are no rules about the type of writing and we honestly welcome anyone willing to work quietly, so people have written songs and grocery lists, journal entries and grant applications as well as novels and PhDs. The most common question we get ab...

Paragraph Planet

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 10:25:25 +0100

Other features have been added over time: you can write a sequel (which must also be 75 words), there’s an archive section with previously published tales (over 1000 at the time of writing); you can comment on paragraphs, find out more about contributors in the author section, plus I’ve recently introduced Author Interviews and a map of writing groups.

So why did I start Paragraph Planet? I’m not a web designer but I enjoyed learning HTML to set up websites publicising my freelance work. I...

Writing and Me - Derek Flynn

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 10:41:15 +0100

And, to start off with, there are the obvious differences between the two. For me, one of the main differences is that writing music and writing prose require a different headspace. I can’t write a chapter of a book and then turn around and pick up a guitar and start writing a song. When I’m writing a story, I need to concentrate on that and vice versa. Another difference is, you don’t usually sit down and plan out a whole song in advance, using flow-charts and character biographies. But, t...

Help a Lost Typewriter

Wed, 22 Jun 2011 18:02:39 +0100

For a month we showed up every morning at 10.00 and sat at our desks and we wrote. I was used to writing as an individual pursuit, but it was amazing how refreshing it was to have someone else sitting across from you to brainstorm with, to read your drafts, to help work through those moments where you might otherwise give up. Within the space of a fortnight, we had a solid draft of two plays written. I don’t think either of us had ever produced work so quickly. It really felt like it all just f...

Belfast Girls - Gerry McCullough

Tue, 24 May 2011 08:53:07 +0100

Belfast Girls is the story of three girls growing up in the new, emerging Belfast, after the ceasefires, and of their lives and loves. It is also the story of the men who matter to them. It is a thriller, a romance, a comedy – like most people’s lives. But it has, I hope, a lot more depth than that suggests.

The three girls come from different religious backgrounds, and, starting off as childhood friends, they manage to hold on to that friendship. There’s kidn...

Any Dream Will Do - Maria Duffy

Thu, 19 May 2011 06:53:53 +0100

I never stopped wanting to be an author but as time moved on and I got married and started a family, it was a dream that was firmly perched at the back of my mind.· It was only when my fourth and last child started school three years ago that I decided I was going to pursue the dream.· I took my laptop and began to write – the words, plots and characters that had built up in my mind for years spilling onto the page.

When I had the book written, I began to look online for help for writers as ...

Redferne - Maurice Connolly

Fri, 06 May 2011 09:03:02 +0100

Five years ago I had a serious heart operation. When I was recuperating from this I decided to go back to writing. As you know writing can be a great therapy--it takes your mind off the stresses and strains. Anyway I succeeded in writing the novel 'Redferne.' I got the manuscript printed in book form in Kilkenny. I had a book launch at the New Ross Library. The book is basically a comedy. For a self-publication it sold quite well--around 1300 copies.

Those sales were all in the local area....

Lissa Oliver

Wed, 13 Apr 2011 09:28:49 +0100

If you enjoy what you write then so will others. I always set out to write the articles I want to read. It’s the same with fiction, I conjure up characters in my mind and only when they’ve become my best friends or won my heart do I set them down on paper. By then I’m passionate about their passage through life. Hopefully that will be conveyed to my readers, who will also care about them and want to see them through to the end of their story. Character, I feel, is more important than plot. ...

Finding Your Niche

Sun, 13 Feb 2011 21:16:26 +0100

My English teacher taught me to enjoy writing. That love has never left me. When I became a clergyman, it was clear that I was going to write a lot of words even if they might usually be on the same theme.

Retirement prompted a different kind of subject. My relaxation reading had always been about dangerous fictional heroes and the detectives who eventually caught them. Mystery, murder, suspense with an occasional touch of violence and romance was my diet. It contrasted sharply with the more ser...

If I Can - You Can

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 23:20:28 +0100

Right, let’s start again.

The cat ate the goldfinch. Head first; even the bones and feathers didn’t bother her…

What a difference a word makes eh! It was a goldfinch – a bird, a tweet-tweet, not a goldfish! Now the later paragraph about the birds flying and the spirit of the goldfinch made some sense.

You may laugh, or dismiss it, but think of how frustrating it is when you can’t see what is written in front of you right. Can you imagine how difficult and slow reading or writing ...