Alan Early, author of Arthur Quinn & The World Serpent, reading from his second novel, which will be published in August. Reading and games.

Debbie Thomas, author of Dead hairy, reading from her second novel, which will be published later this year. Reading and improvisation.

Mary Costello and Nuala Ní Chonchúir reading at the Magpie Inn, Dalkey.

Readings from the Stinging Fly summer issue at The Magpie Inn: Claire-Louise Bennett, Leona Lee Cully, Melissa Diem, Stephen Murray and Gerry Smith; compered by Dave Iordan.

Saturday June 16th, 7-8.30pm
The Vico, Castle Street.
€10

axis: Ballymun presents The Parting Glass, by Dermot Bolger

Performed by Ray Yeates
Directed by Mark O’ Brien
Produced by Niamh Ní Chonchubhair

Where were you when our World Cup dreams were dashed? Eoin was at the heart of the drama in Stade de France, Nov 18th 2009. Reunited with Mick and Shane, the three amigos on that fateful night… Heartfelt and hilarious, ‘The Parting Glass’ is a one-man show, charting Eoin’s journey through love, friendship, family and Ireland’s turbulent economic climate. Having toured Ireland, the U.S and France, ‘The Parting Glass’ by Dermot Bolger will be making a special appearance at the Dalkey Arts Festival – just in time for the Euro’s and Father’s day!

* * * * The Irish Times, The Guardian, The Sunday Business Post, The Examiner.
“Yeates’s histrionic cheerleading is inspired. The play’s rousing climax will make even the most devoted theater lover wish that she followed sports“. – The New York Times

“This play is moving, hilarious and always gripping and whether you’re just home, about to leave or here to stay it’s definitely worth catching”. – Entertainment.ie

Dave Kenny is a journalist, broadcaster and best-selling author. His books include The Trib: Highlights from the Sunday Tribune, The Little Buke of Dublin, Erindipity The Irish Miscellany and Erindipity Rides Again. He also wrote and co-produced the chart-topping book and CD, ‘The Brilliant Irish Flute/InishTurkBeg Sessions’ with Warner Music International. He contributes to the Sunday Independent and the Irish Daily Mail, and regularly hosts literary events for Unesco and Dublin City Libraries.

Bryan Hoey is acclaimed as one of Ireland’s most versatile singers. At 18, he was one of the youngest tenors to win the Joseph O’Meara cup in the Dublin Feis Ceoil and has also won the Harold McMillan International Award. His repertoire covers a range of 90 roles, in productions including Die Fledermaus, My Fair Lady and many Gilbert & Sullivan operettas. He has also recorded soundtracks for films like Hear My Song and featured on The Late Late Show and Music of The Nation.

Alan Early was born in a small town in Leitrim, Ireland, but now lives in Dublin. From an early age he would write and illustrate short stories about Banshees and ghost animals and whatever else struck his imagination. His first attempt at writing a novel was while he was still at school and was about, amongst other things, a telepathic goldfish. Age 10, he visited Dublinia, a Viking museum and so began an interest in Norse lore. It also began a habit of staring into the faces of wax works, waiting for them to blink.

The Stinging Fly Roadshow is coming to The Magpie Inn as part of a national tour showcasing the talents of some of the many writers who have published work in the magazine over the past 15 years. Fiction writers, Claire Louise Bennett and Leona Lee Cully will be joined by poets Melissa Diem, Stephen Murray and Gerard Smyth. The Summer 2012 issue is guest edited by the award-winning poet, Dave Lordan, who will also MC the event.

Dave Lordan was born in Derby, and grew up in Clonakilty in West Cork. In 2005 he won the Patrick Kavanagh Award for Poetry. His collections are The Boy in The Ring (Cliffs of Moher, Salmon Poetry, 2007), which won the Strong Award for best first collection by an Irish writer and was shortlisted for the Irish Times poetry prize; and Invitation to a Sacrifice (Salmon Poetry, 2010). He is the recipient of the 2011 Ireland Chair of Poetry Bursary.

Debbie Thomas has worked as a BBC radio reporter and as a journalist in Bangladesh, Uganda and South Africa. She now lives in Kildare and works for a charity supporting people with leprosy. She writes for various magazines and runs a book club and creative writing sessions for children.

Nuala Ní Chonchúir is a short story writer, novelist and poet from Dublin, and living in Galway. Her fourth short story collection, Mother America is published by New Island in June 2012. Nuala’s story ‘Peach’, in the Winter2011 issue of Prairie Schooner, won the Jane Geske Award and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Her novel You was published to critical acclaim by New Island in 2010. www.nualanichonchuir.com

Are you a bookworm or a bookbrain? Test your literary knowledge with Gary Jermyn’s and Paddy Cullivan’s Midsummer Book Quiz, and round off the festival on a high.

Will Booklovers fight back? Lessons from The Exchange Bookshop.

With the passing of the Exchange Bookshop a huge hole has been left in the lives of its many customers. What next for Dalkey? Join some longtime customers for a debate about what the future holds for Dalkey’s booklovers. Chaired by David McWilliams with Mark Little, Dave Kenny and Michael McLaughlin, head of Penguin Ireland.

If anyone needs no introduction, it’s Ireland’s Nobel-winning poet. The Dalkey Book Festival is honoured to have Seamus Heaney appear for a reading of his work.

Join musicians Barry Devlin and Jim Lockhart for a masterclass in lyric writing.

Westmeath-born, now Sligo resident Dermot Healy is widely acknowledged as one of the authentic voices of the Irish emigrant.

Aifric Campbell, former MD at Morgan Stanley, whose third novel On the Floor is set in the trading rooms and the world of high finance, talks to David McWilliams about finance in fiction.

Young adult fiction is the single most popular genre in modern fiction. How does it work and what is it like to write? Sinead Gleeson talks to some of Ireland’s most successful teen writers, Pauline McLynn, Sarah Webb and Anna Carey about what inspires them.

At last year’s Book Festival, the smash hit Shopping In Chains told the story of Alice Devine, a hard woman to keep down in any recession. Now she’s back and this time she’s serious. Alice Devine is going to war and God help the banks.

David McWilliams gave her the idea; Richard Boyd Barrett showed her how; Alice does it on her own. This brilliant, funny, moving play by local playwright Shay Linehan, premieres at the Dalkey Book Festival.

‘I’ve been sane as a sandwich all my life and what good did it do me. It’s a highly overrated condition anyway – sanity.’ – Alice Devine.

One of our most popular authors last year, Nicola Pierce, is back in Dallkey on the centenary of the Titanic’s sinking. She will be reading some new material and signing for fans.

Were the 1970s the decade that we really let our hair down? Join Ferdia MacAnna in conversation with Diarmaid Ferriter (whose new book Ambiguous Republic: Ireland in the 1970s is published this September), Barry Devlin and others for a discussion about how Ireland got its groove back during the real period of revolution – a decade of huge cultural, political and social change.

Comic crazy? Alan Nolan, creator of the Murder Can Be Fatal series, will show you how to make your very own comic in this illustration workshop.
Under 12s must be accompanied by an adult

Judi Curtin is Ireland’s most popular author for girls aged 8-12. Journey through time with Judi as she reads from her latest novel ‘Double Trouble’, in which Lauren, her best friend Tilly and Saturn the cat travel to Ancient Rome. There will also be a Q&A session and the chance to get your books signed.
Under 12s must be accompanied by an adult

People do it all the time– why not you? Join Jennifer O’Connell for a panel discussion with Monica McInerney, Marita Conlon McKenna, Sarah Webb and Sinead Moriarty on the ins and outs of writing popular fiction. This event will sell out fast, so make sure to book in advance.

Bestselling writer of more than forty books, Gordon Snell shares the magic of storytelling with young readers and writers.
Under 12s must be accompanied by an adult

Little Beasts and Young Explorers are invited to join award winning illustrator Chris Judge for doodling and storytelling. Learn to draw your very own ‘Lonely Beast’ and hear all about The Great Explorer’s adventure to the North Pole.
Under 12s must be accompanied by an adult

What is there to say about Derek Landy that his fans don’t already know? 17 million books sold in 33 languages of the multi-award winning Skulduggery Pleasant series. Screenwriter of the movies Dead Bodies and Boy Eats Girl. Owner of too many cats and dogs. Destroyer of worlds? The jury is still out on that last one. Grab the rare chance to see him in person in advance of the forthcoming Skulduggery novel, Kingdom of The Wicked. After the talk there will be a chance to ask your burning questions and have your books signed by the author.

One of Dalkey – and the world’s – best loved writers will hold court in Finnegans on Sunday morning, spinning tales and answering questions about storytelling and the writing life. This offers an exclusive chance to hear Maeve Binchy read a short story, which is set in Dalkey and which she has written specially for the festival.

What is a publisher looking for? How can you improve your pitch and improve your chances of getting published? This workshop gets results –just look at the success stories on inkwell.ie . In this workshop, Vanessa will explain the blueprint from keyboard to bookshelf. Places are limited to 15 people.

Back for another crack at the tell-tale heart, Midnight Poe, presented by Bewley’s Café Theatre with The Dalkey Book Festival features one of Poe’s best-known stories, The Cask of Amontillado – a pitch-black comedy of revenge, and also includes his chilling unfinished final tale, The Lighthouse, along with musical settings of some of his greatest poems.

This was one of last year’s most popular events – don’t miss the chance to catch it before it sells out.

Remember Saipan? Ever thought what it must be like to live with Roy Keane? And during the 2002 World Cup Final? Acclaimed bestselling author of the Ross O’Carroll dispatches, Paul Howard will read from his new book, the touching memoir of Trigg, the dearly departed four-legged friend of Saipan’s most famous tourist, Roy Keane. Housetrained ticketholders only.

Macklin Method and Madness: a theatrical romp with Gary Jermyn and Michael Ford

Forget Stanislavski. Charles Macklin was the original method actor, according to Gary Jermyn and Michael Ford, co-writer/performers of this new play that pitches Macklin’s 1741 debut as Shylock in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice as a radio play for two voices broadcast at the height of the London Blitz in 1941. Despite the air raid sirens, the show must go on.

In this State of the Nation debate, Barry Murphy asks Julian Gough whether Ireland has been reduced to a province of Germany.

Fresh from après-match, Barry Murphy introduces us to his German alter ego, Gunter, who will host this debate with Germanic aplomb.

Between the troika on one hand and the fiscal compact on the other, the green green grass of home is starting to look a lot like the grassy verge beside the U-Bahn. Or is it? Sometimes it’s hard to figure out what’s going on. Barry Murphy is confused, so he’s asked writer and Berlin resident Julian Gough to help explain where we are, who owes what and most of all: who’s in charge.

Over one hundred years after Lady Gregory and WB Yeats opened the Irish Literary Theatre, the Abbey is still packing audiences in. But in the Internet age, is our national theatre still relevant? How is it adapting to the social, cultural and economic challenges in our society. Join Fintan O’Toole who thinks it has failed and Sunday Independent Literary critic Emer O’Kelly for what promises to be a lively debate.

At last year’s Book Festival, the smash hit Shopping In Chains told the story of Alice Devine, a hard woman to keep down in any recession. Now she’s back and this time she’s serious. Alice Devine is going to war and God help the banks.

David McWilliams gave her the idea; Richard Boyd Barrett showed her how; Alice does it on her own. This brilliant, funny, moving play by local playwright Shay Linehan, premieres at the Dalkey Book Festival.

‘I’ve been sane as a sandwich all my life and what good did it do me. It’s a highly overrated condition anyway – sanity.’ – Alice Devine.

Celebrate Bloomsday by joining the legendary Eamon Morrissey for an exclusive performance of his amazing one-man show, Joycemen. Originally performed at the Peacock Theatre in 1980, it has been revived many times since, including at 1992′s World Expo in Barcelona. Eamon needs no introduction – whether you’re an enthusiastic theatregoer, a Fair City addict, you’ll agree he’s the best thing since a pint of plain.
Tickets are limited, so please book early!

Immerse yourself in the world of Joyce’s Ulysses with a guided walk around several key Dalkey locations that inspired a masterpiece, introduced with a re-enactment of Stephen Dedalus’s morning class in the Nestor episode.

Unlike many of his contemporary writers, James Joyce had real experience of every point on the class spectrum, and in Ulysses, wrote one of the most vivid representations of the working classes in literature. Join Joyce scholar, Richard Boyd Barrett, for a discussion of Joyce’s relationship with class and culture and the theme of perpetual revolution.

Fresh from the success of his first novel, City of Bohane, Kevin Barry hasn’t forgotten about the form that made his name. Dark Lies The Island, his new collection of short stories, might be “like a spade to the face”, according to the Guardian, but expect a violence-free reading this afternoon at the Masonic Hall. Not to be missed.

Are we entering a new era of great Irish authors, or is the writing on the wall? Critic Fintan O’Toole and writer Julian Gough, well-known for his controversial view that today’s young writers are trying to replicate the past, join Nadine O’Regan for a discussion of the state of the art.

Do you have a masterpiece in the cupboard? A bestseller under the bed? Here’s your chance to pitch it to some of the best agents in the Irish publishing industry. Plus there’s an amazing prize to be won. There’s only one catch: you have to do it in 5 minutes or less. Come and uncover new writing at Dalkey! Application forms available here.

We are delighted to welcome friend of the festival, Conall Morrison, to Dalkey.

Conall has directed numerous plays for the Abbey Theatre. He has also worked with the Royal Shakespeare Company; The National Theatre, London; English National Opera; and – most recently – the Globe Theatre. He has written several original plays and adaptations.

He is particularly interested in the creation of new work and has developed new scripts with writers such as Tom Murphy, Marina Carr, Tom MacIntyre.

His workshop for the Dalkey Book Festival will be a hands-on guide to the central principles of playwriting, the disciplines without which no play can stand successfully on the stage. Character, structure, theme, style, language, and more – a whistlestop tour of the essential ingredients of all good plays.

How to blag your way in Joyce. If, like most of us, you’ve pretended to read Ulysses but haven’t got passed that Stately Buck Mulligan stuff, this one’s for you. It’s not really that scary – it’s only a big book about a fella in advertising who goes for a stroll around Dublin. Take the leap with The Flying Bookclub and find out why everyone’s so mad about this James Joyce character at this “Feel The Fear And Read It Anyway” Ulysses workshop with the Flying Bookclub.

Saturday 16th June, 1pm-3.30pm
Ouzos Bar & Grill
€35

This will be a hoot! Sayings and Songs of John Stanislaus Joyce: a Bloomsday musical extravaganza with composer, singer and pianist Tom Cullivan and actor Bryan Hoey.
(The performance runs from 1pm to 1.50pm with lunch included after the show.)

In the wonderfully evocative Masonic Hall, poet, playwright and Hennessy Literary Award winner Dermot Bolger talks to Carlo Gebler author of August in July, Life of a Drum, Father and I and A Good Day for A Dog about his memories of growing up in Dalkey, his career as a writer and his book, The Dead Eight, which has been nominated for The Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year 2012.

Yvonne Cassidy is a writer originally from Dalkey who now lives in New York. She will be reading from her latest novel, What Might Have Been Me, followed by Q & A.

On the morning of the day that’s in it, we’ve a real treat. In this special event for Bloomsday, local author Joseph O’Connor will give a reading from the opening chapter of James Joyce’s Ulysses.

What is a publisher looking for? How can you improve your pitch and improve your chances of getting published? This workshop gets results –just look at the success stories on inkwell.ie . In this workshop, Vanessa will explain the blueprint from keyboard to bookshelf. Places are limited to 15 people.

As Syria seethes, Israel shapes up to Iran and the Middle East threatens to explode, legendary journalist and resident of Dalkey, Robert Fisk, gives his unique and brilliant perspective on the state of the Arab world.

The Winner Effect: Ian Robertson in conversation with Margaret E Ward

Bill Clinton, Napoleon, Charlie Haughey, Dominic Strauss Khan: what drives these men to take such risks and how does success and power change the way their brains work? Trinity professor of psychology Ian Robertson discusses how success affects the brain, the subject of his new book, The Winner Effect, with American journalist Margaret E Ward.

A must for anyone interested in where the country is going. Join award-winning, bestselling polemicist and Dalkey resident John Waters. Expect culture, politics, the state of the nation and more in this his first public discussion about his new book, How We Lost the Plot.

Moody Blues: Eoin McNamee reads from Blue Tango, with music by Keith Donald

Blue Tango is based on a real life murder and the ensuing cover up. In a unique performance, dark and risqué like his novel, Eoin McNamee reads extracts from the book with music from one of Ireland’s finest musicians, Keith Donald –former saxophonist with Moving Hearts – that brilliantly evokes the innocence and darkness of that period.

No stranger to Dalkey, Jennifer Johnston, one of Ireland’s finest writers – and, for Roddy Doyle, the finest – in conversation with the masterful observer and veteran broadcaster, Olivia O’Leary.

At last year’s Book Festival, the smash hit Shopping In Chains told the story of Alice Devine, a hard woman to keep down in any recession. Now she’s back and this time she’s serious. Alice Devine is going to war and God help the banks.

David McWilliams gave her the idea; Richard Boyd Barrett showed her how; Alice does it on her own. This brilliant, funny, moving play by local playwright Shay Linehan, premieres at the Dalkey Book Festival.

‘I’ve been sane as a sandwich all my life and what good did it do me. It’s a highly overrated condition anyway – sanity.’ – Alice Devine.

How to blag your way in Joyce. If, like most of us, you’ve pretended to read Ulysses but haven’t got passed that Stately Buck Mulligan stuff, this one’s for you. It’s not really that scary – it’s only a big book about a fella in advertising who goes for a stroll around Dublin. Take the leap with The Flying Bookclub and find out why everyone’s so mad about this James Joyce character at this “Feel The Fear And Read It Anyway” Ulysses workshop with the Flying Bookclub.

Service Users from St. John of God Carmona Services, Dalkey Education Centre and Transition Year students from Holy Child Secondary School, Killiney have come together to take part in a collaborative Book Making project.

Together they have produced a series of books. However the books don’t look like traditional books. What they have in common with a traditional book is that they tell a story through words. The rest has been left entirely up to our imagination.

Just some of the books they have come up with are a cookbook that looks like a cake tin and a children’s book that looks like a jigsaw. Breaking out of the hardback covers of a traditional book, these hand made books are different and unique; in themselves one off works of art. There was much enjoyment in making them and we hope you enjoy coming to have a look at them.

After a couple of years toying with ideas, she joined a creative writing group and began to write The Baby Trail. which was snapped up by Penguin Publishing in the UK and Ireland and has, to date, been translated into twenty languages.

Since writing The Baby Trail, Sinead has moved back to Dublin where she lives with her husband, two sons and baby girl.

Her sixth book, Pieces of my Heart, went straight in at number 1 in the Irish charts and was nominated for an Irish Book Award.

Her seventh book – Me and My Sisters – went straight in at number 1 in the Irish charts and was nominated for an Irish Book Award.

We are delighted to welcome Sinead to the Dalkey Book Festival where she will talk about how she writes her bestsellers.

He lives in Ireland with a variety of cats, a German Shepherd, and two geriatric Staffordshire Bull Terriers who keep peeing on his kitchen floor because they think it’s funny.


Howard has also written two Ross O’Carroll-Kelly plays ­ The Last Days of the Celtic Tiger, the fastest-selling play in the history of Dublin’s Olympia Theatre, and Between Foxrock and a Hard Place, which played to packed houses at the Olympia in 2010, as well as the Cork Opera House and the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin, in 2011. The 12th Ross O’Carroll Kelly novel will be published in autumn 2012.

‘Dermot Healy is Ireland’s greatest writer.’ Roddy Doyle.

‘The finest prose writer at work in Ireland today … the publication of a new novel by Dermot Healy is enormously important, a genuinely exciting event in the world of literature.’ Deirdre Madden

He has published a number of books, including Pity The Nation: Lebanon At War and The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of The Middle East. He is a longtime resident of Dalkey.

Keith is also a composer for theatre, film and television. He composed and played the saxophone soundtrack for Neil Jordan’s 1982 film “Angel”. Keith was also part of the team that won a BAFTA award for “United”, a film which was conceived as a commentary on the divisive issue of parades in Northern Ireland politics. In addition he has composed music for many BBC documentaries, BBC films and written music for plays.

Keith is also currently Chairman of the Board of the Irish Music Rights Organisation and of Burma Action Ireland.

Tom Cullivan was born in Cavan in 1939. He began to play the piano at an early age and had lessons locally until his mid teens. He began to compose for the theatre during his student days at what is now NUI Galway, writing extensively for the Taibhdhearc and Druid companies. Apart from theatre he has written in all genres and has an extensive catalogue. In addition to an opera and incidental music for drama, he has written six works for narrator singer and piano: on the poetry and song of the Jacobite century (Ceo Draíochta): on the great harper/ composers of Gaelic Ireland and their music: (Síolrath Ceoil), on Anglo Irish song (Song of Ireland): on the poetry and song of the 1798 and 1803 rebellions (Myles Byrne Remembers):on John Stanislaus Joyce (Something in a Distillery): and “Irish Songs of Resistence, Exile and Revolt.

As a composer, his preference is for the supremacy of melody, straightforward harmony, well-tried patterns of rhythm and form and the concept of music as spontaneous expression. Together with his background in Irish traditional music and his study of the great collections (Bunting, Petrie, Joyce etc.), this makes of his music an attractive fusion of the traditional and the classical with a distinctly Irish flavour. His music has been peformed in Europe and the United States of America. He is a former Chairman of the Association of Irish Composers.

She went on to write several more books for children which were also very well received. The Blue Horse reached No. 1 on the Bestseller List and in 1993 won the BISTO BOOK OF THE YEAR Award. Safe Harbour is the story of two English children evacuated from London during World War ll to live with their grandfather in Greystones, Co Wicklow. It was shortlisted for the BISTO Book of the Year Award, 1995. Marita’s first foray into the world of fantasy, In Deep Dark Wood, was a huge success.

Marita has won several awards, including the International Reading Association Award, the Osterreichischer Kinder und Jugendbuchpreis, the Reading Association of Ireland Award and the Bisto Book of the Year Award.

In 2005 Paddy became the ‘Third Wheel’ in the Leviathan Political Cabaret, as resident Musical Satirist along with presenter David McWilliams and producer Naoise Nunn. A hugely popular debating and entertainment forum, Leviathan graduated from its small beginnings in Dublin’s Crawdaddy and the Button Factory to becoming the starting point for the Mindfield and Kilkenomics festivals which have become hugely successful in their own right (and as part of the Electric Picnic).

In Leviathan, Paddy writes material to order as dictated by the debate subject matter. This has led to hundreds of songs, slideshows and monologues based on the vagaries of the economic and cultural fortunes of Ireland from the height of the Celtic Tiger to the depths of the World Depression. Shows such as ‘You Are Now Entering Free Dairy’ and ‘Irish History from Maps’ were highlights of the Mindfield Festivals and Paddy will be bringing a new show to New York in September 2012.

Maeve Binchy was born in County Dublin and was educated at the Holy Child convent in Killiney and at University College, Dublin. After a spell as a teacher in various girls’ schools, she joined the Irish Times. Her first novel, Light a Penny Candle, was published in 1982, and since then she has written more than a dozen novels and short story collections, each one of them bestsellers. Several have been adapted for cinema and television, most notably Circle of Friends and Tara Road.

Maeve Binchy was awarded the Lifetime Achievement award at the British Book Awards in 1999. In 2007 she joined an august band of writers including Seamus Heaney and John Banville when she was presented with the Irish PEN/AT Cross Literary Award to recognise a lifetime of literary achievement. She is married to the writer and broadcaster Gordon Snell and lives in Dalkey, Co Dublin.

She is a regular contributor to RTE’s Tubridy on 2FM, the History Show with Myles Dungan, the Daily Show and TV3’sTonight with Vincent Browne. Margaret has also presented Newstalk’s Business Breakfast and was known for her slogan “telling it like it is”. This native New Yorker was born to Irish parents who emigrated in the 1960s. Margaret, a self-confessed historical archive nerd, moved to Ireland in 1995 to research a book … and never left.

Her books include: Saving and investing for life, Bob Marley and Every Blade of Grass, an Irish girl’s Civil War story.

Eamon Morrissey has been working with the words of Brian O’Nolan (Flann O’Brien, Myles na gCopaleen) for over 35 years. In 1974 he first adapted and presented ‘The Brother’. Happily ‘The Brother’ is still going strong all these years later.

Eamon also adapted ‘The Third Policeman’ for a successful stage production. Although written in 1939 ‘The Third Policeman’ was not published until after O’Nolan’s death in 1966, but in true Mylesian fashion, Brian O’Nolan also adapted much of ‘The Third Policeman’ for another novel which was published as ‘The Dalkey Archive’ in 1964.

Although Eamon’s walkabout will not include diving into a cave at the Vico Swimming Club, it will include more familiar items, including ‘A Pint of Plain’.

Roddy Doyle says, “Kevin Barry is a unique, a one-man school. His work is hilarious and unpredictable- and always brilliant.”

Her first novel, Another Alice (1996) was nominated for the Irish Times Irish fiction prize. Her second novel Nothing Simple (2005) was shortlisted for the Irish Novel of the Year at the inaugural Irish Book Awards. Her most recent book In Your Face (2007), a memoir of her diagnosis of and treatment for oral cancer, was named as a favourite book of 2007 by several commentators.

Born in Dublin, she has lived in London and America before returning to Ireland in 1990.