Irish Writers Centre | looking up/looking down

I can hardly believe we are already more than a month into the second half of 2024. There’s been little from me here so far this year, but much has been happening away from view.

My reading has taken a bit of a hit, but I’m beginning to get back into it. A book I’m reading at the moment is Irish poet Elaine Feeney’s first novel, As You Were (2020)—highly original and I am absolutely loving it. Her most recent novel, How to Build a Boat, was longlisted for last year’s Booker Prize. Has anyone read that one?

Other reading highlights so far: Anne Michaels’ Held, Claire Keegan’s So Late in the Day, Michael Cunningham’s Day, Rebecca Higgie’s The History of Mischief and Jessica Zhan Mei Yu’s But the Girl. And of course, Katrina Kell’s Chloe, which I featured in my ‘Talking (new) fiction’ series: Q&A here.

Recently I had the pleasure of being chosen to participate in the International Lamplight Online Residency: Ireland, run (via Zoom) by Varuna here and the Irish Writers Centre in Dublin—a wonderful opportunity, given that my work in progress has one foot in Ireland and the other in Australia. Among the many creative and professional development joys of the residency has been the long list of titles I’ve compiled along the way, and I’m so looking forward to reading: novels by the seven other (Irish and Australian) participants, as well as others recommended in our various sessions. Wholehearted thanks to Varuna and the Irish Writers Centre for devising this excellent online program and for welcoming me into it.

I also recently travelled to Ireland (really, the traditional way, by plane!) for research and a highly productive, many-times-delayed residency at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre—often called Annaghmakerrig, the original name of the house and also the name of the lake it sits beside. There are so many things I love about this place, not least the fact that it is a multi-arts residency, and the many brilliant arts practitioners I’ve met over the four times I’ve been there have included painters, sculptors and other visual artists, dancers, musicians and theatre directors, along with poets, novelists, playwrights and translators. See below for some of my photo highlights of Annaghmakerrig and its surrounds, and the drumlins of County Monaghan.

Events during the year so far have included talks on Kathleen O’Connor of Paris for the WA Society of Artists and the Perth Women in Petroleum book club—two organisations that have been in existence for years measured in decades. And I loved being part of a panel event on ‘Story and Place’ for Love to Read Local Week at Guildford Library, with fellow writer Rebecca Higgie and chair Bianca Breen.