Short Story of the Year longlist

I am very happy that one of my stories has made the Writing.ie Short Story of the Year longlist. More here. Crossing fingers for shortlist luck, now.

If my story does make the shortlist, there will be public voting anon, so I'll be counting on you, my ONE reader, to vote ;) And there'd be a lovely night out at the Irish Book Awards to boot. Glamour!!

Come on, Jupiter, arrange that joyride!!

BEAUTIFUL STROKESTOWN

Strokestown, and the Women in Literature Event, was so beautiful in so many ways: that gorgeous Georgian town (sadly now like so many Irish towns a shadow of its former lively self); the house itself; the famine museum; the conference and its many speakers - Christine Kinealy, Marita Conlon-McKenna, Jessamine O'Connor, Luke Gibbons et cetera. The fresh food in the Strokestown Park cafe! The sambuca...(enough said.)

Thanks to Jason King of the Irish Heritage Trust for the opportunity to take part. I fell in love with the place and am going back with my husb and youngest at Christmas for their Victorian Experience.

A few pics to give a flavour of the event and surrounds:

Jessamine

Luke

View behind the house

In through the window

Town doorway

Marita

Christine

Orla, chairperson of Roscommon Co Co, gave a rousing, feminist speech

Famine museum

Irish Women in Literature event

I'm reading at this free 2 day Irish Women in Literature event at Strokestown Park, Thursday 5th October. All welcome!

REVIEW JTJ AND EVENTS

Liam Murphy reviewed Joyride to Jupiter in yesterday's Munster Express:

'There was a time when people expected short stories to be like single theme short novellas, and then magazine fiction changed all that. Stories got shorter and often became like poems, vague like a fleeting image, a flash of emotion, a realisation without resolution. Collections of short stories seemed to be based on a theme or trope; infidelity, expectation, imperfection, loneliness, betrayal and the modern one of uncoupling couples.

Nuala O'Connor who used to be Nuala Ní Chonchúir until Penguin USA insisted on  'identity clarity' for Miss Emily - O'Connor's most successful novel. Her fourth novel will be out next year, and the collection, Joyride To Jupiter is her sixth collection of short stories, alongside four poetry books. I feel like writing Nuala Ní rather than Nuala O.

An Ovid quotation suggests a collection about the 'perjuries of lovers', but there is an 'occasional' feel about some of these stories. This book has been with me during the best summer ever and rarely was I disappointed. A few stories I had to reread to understand, but perhaps I was seduced by the language and the fresh, Irishness of her phrasing.

The title story, 'Joyride To Jupiter' surprised me and took me unawares. When I got to 'Futuretense', another story with a makeup or cosmetic theme, I went back and read both together, seeking a linking theme.

'SquidInky' about a tattooist was my favourite with its visual, descriptive style and a line "Spitting women and crowing hens will surely come to some bad ends", led into one of the loneliest passage in the story "My heart opens and closes like a mouth that wants to speak but can't form the words". Nuala O can form the words and can seesaw the human heart as in 'The Boy From Petropolis' and 'Napoli Abu'. Where the opening line is a catcher for a page turner "Fuck knows how I ended up agreeing to go to Naples with a spinster".

The shorter stories didn't satisfy me, but the last story 'Storks' caught the mood of a hidden past, a 'betrayal' that gets in the way of present happiness. The last page is as sensual a thrill as you could ask for "All will be well".'

*

Next Saturday I am reading with Alan McMonagle, moderated by Catherine Dunne, at the inaugural Bray Literary Festival. 2pm, Bray Town Hall. More about the fest here.

And on Culture Night, this Friday, the artist collective I am a member of, Group 8, has the opening of its annual exhibition. This one is called Majesty in the Minute. 6.30pm, Ballinasloe Library. More at our blog here.

I had a great time in Cork at the Short Story Festival last weekend but am way, way to busy to blog it, sadly. My new novel (novel #5!) has joyfully taken over my head and my life, and I have a ton of other projects and things I'm involved in too. Busy is good. Too busy can be a bit of a headwreck. Onward!

FICTION ZERO INTERVIEW

I'm interviewed by ZeroFlash about writing and publishing ups and downs today. Here.

BEAUTIFUL REVIEW OF JOYRIDE TO JUPITER

Des Breen has written a beautiful review of Joyride to Jupiter for the Irish Examiner. Truly delighted with it.

TERRYGLASS ARTS FEST READING

I'm at TerryglassArts Festival on Friday 18th August, reading from #JoyridetoJupiter, 6pm, Riverrun. Free event!

FARMLEIGH EVENT - Domestic Frictions

This Thursday I'm at Farmleigh doing an event with writer-in-res Mia Gallagher and her other guests John Boyne, Sean Millar and Maeve McCarthy. 8pm kick-off with words, music, art and chat.

I'm thrilled to perform at Farmleigh - my Granda, Joseph Murray, lived there as a child with his family (his mother was a cook/housekeeper; his father collected rents). And my maternal Granda, Hugh O'Connor, worked there as a coachman - he took care of the horses among other duties; he had a key to the Silver Bridge, so he could feed the horses on a Sunday. We could see the Victorian Clock Tower on the Farmeleigh Estate from my childhood home across the River Liffey (my parents still live there) - it's one of those landmarks that just says 'home'.

Here's the blurb about the event from the Farmleigh site:

The Home and Family in Words, Song and Images

The Ballroom, 8pm Thursday August 10th

Join 2017 Farmleigh Writer-in-Residence Mia Gallagher for a unique event – an evening of song, words and images which will celebrate and expose the intimate yet often strangely troubled realm of family, home and domestic life. The event will feature some of Ireland’s best loved writers and artists, including the marvellous John Boyne (author of the international bestseller The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas), renowned novelist and poet Nuala O’Connor (author of the International DUBLIN-longlisted Miss Emily), singer-songwriter extraordinaire Sean Millar and award-winning visual artist Maeve McCarthy.

Prepare to be provoked, entertained and inspired as these wonderful artists share their work, insights and observations. The first part of the evening will feature readings, music and film. This will be followed by a lively discussion with all the artists, moderated by Mia.

To apply for FREE tickets to this event email farmleighinfo@opw.ie before 5pm Wednesday 9th August.

Winners will receive 2 free tickets. Please note that only winners will be notified.

For further information on this event contact 01 815 5914

INTERVIEW - LEANNE RADOJKOVICH & RACHEL J. FENTON

I am delighted to welcome two New Zealand based writers to the blog today, Leanne Radojkovich and Rachel J Fenton, who is also a visual artist. Leanne's début short story collection First fox, illustrated by Rachel, is just out from The Emma Press, a really exciting English publisher producing beautiful books.

The Cuckoo Review says this 'collection of unusual, fairy-tale like stories… brilliantly enchants and enthralls the reader… First fox [is] unique. With its oddly complex realities mixed with bizarre yet magical moments… The power of these stories… resonated with me long after reading.'

The title story is my new favourite flash and I can't wait to give it a close-reading with students soon. Listen to Leanne read 'First fox' on YouTube here. And you can buy First fox here.

Leanne Radojkovich

Leanne Radojkovich lives in Auckland and her flash fiction street art has popped up all around the world from USA to France and Tanzania, as well as in New Zealand. Her stories have appeared in many journals and been placed in numerous competitions.

Rachel J Fenton

Rachel J Fenton writes poetry, graphic poetry and short stories. Her work is published widely. Her unpublished novel Some Things the English was runner-up in the Dundee International Book Prize and shortlisted for the Cinnamon Press debut novel prize. As Rae Joyce, she co-edited Three Words, an Anthology of Aotearoa Womens Comics.

I began my interview with these two fine, creative women with a few questions to Leanne first, then to Rachel, then some to both.

Nuala: Leanne, talking cats, a woman kept prisoner, birds appearing from walls. There are echoes of fairytales and, therefore, Angela Carter in the stories. Would you count her as an influence? Fairy and folktales in general?

Leanne: I love folk and fairy tales’ matter of fact bare-bones style, and how in these tales the everyday and the otherworldly exist in the same dimension. Juxtaposing fantastic and ordinary elements in a story can feel more truthful, somehow, and bring to light a new way of looking at a situation. However, much as I admire Angela Carter’s stories I don’t think of her as a direct influence. I’d count Grace Paley as number one in that regard; the pared-back brevity of her stories, their frank tone and sharp sense of humour.

N: The stories are awash with references to plants (paw paw, frangipani, banana leaves), birds (cockatiels, crows, roosters) and other animals (cicadas, fox, cat). Is the natural world a go-to place for you as a writer?

L: The natural world is what I enjoy most on my daily rounds – anything growing, flying, running about;  perhaps this is why so many creatures and plants seep into my stories.

N: Children and adults often clash in your stories, with startling consequences. Is this a theme you consciously explore?

L: I chose stories for First fox that seemed to spark off one another - and then saw a theme emerge in some of these regarding children and adults. I hadn’t consciously considered it before, but it’s definitely present in this collection.

N: You have been using new ways to get flash fiction to diverse audiences, such as via YouTube and graffiti. Can you tell me about that?

L: I’ve shared filmed stories on YouTube and SlideShare. SlideShare is my favourite

because the viewer clicks through the images at their own pace and the story
unfolds like a book of captioned photographs. I’ve posted about a dozen YouTube
videos, too. I think of them as a kind of audio/visual chapbook, they’re all
filmed using the same three constraints: one continuous shot, from behind, as I
walk in bare feet along a beach or a road or the bush - unless it’s freezing,
then I wear shoes. 


Perhaps the most fun has come from posting my street art PinUps. I place one of my
nature photos in a $1 frame, paste a story on the back and add a tag saying
Please take me home, I’ll look good on your wall. Then I Blu-Tack the frame to
stairwells, shop windows, public toilets, park benches. Several strangers have
contacted me to say they’ve taken a PinUp on further travels. My favourite came
from an American who picked one up in Auckland and took it home where it hangs
in his lounge “in the hope,” he wrote, “that someday it will disappear from our
wall, one dinner-party evening, to look good on another wall and carry the
story into another imagination.” PinUps have popped up in lots of countries
from USA to China, Sweden and Indonesia, thanks to wonderful friends and family
who wish to be part of the experiment.








Nuala: Rachel, you’re a writer and visual artist. Can you talk about the process of illustrating work that is not your own?




Rachel: Illustrating other people’s work is something I’ve shied away from on-the-whole, partly I think because of not wanting the responsibility. With Leanne’s work, it was different: I knew and loved her stories, she’s an amazing talent, and I knew her personally – the NZ lit scene is super small – so I felt like I had a good handle on her vision for First fox and I felt I could deliver an interpretation that could fulfil Leanne’s and The Emma Press’s expectations but also satisfy my own creative vision for a cohesive body (albeit it small body) of art.




My brief from The Emma Press read along the lines of Six black and white illustrations, some full, some partial, and one cover illustration – details yet to be finalised.




The practical process was a case of closely and intensively reading the stories and jotting or sketching the strongest imagery from them, the moments that felt key without acting as spoilers. I had a choice of two or three strong concepts for each story and I picked out my favourite, worked it up in pencil then my own mix of black and sepia water-based ink, scanned it and converted it to black and white and sent it to Emma, founder of The Emma Press.







N: How did this collaboration come about?




R: I’ve been posting work-in-progress on Instagram, @redhousemary, from the graphic biography that I’m working on, and Leanne was really drawn to one image of Charlotte Brontë walking arm-in-arm with Ellen Nussey – there are few positive depictions of women’s friendships, I feel, and so this perhaps resonated with Leanne and some of the themes in First fox. Leanne had sent a link to this image to The Emma Press and Emma contacted me to invite me to pitch for the job.




As a fan of all things blue, I was immediately drawn to the beautiful cover. You’re no doubt happy with the design, look and feel of the book. Can you talk about that?




I’m chuffed to bits with the book, from the generous layout to the attention to detail; everything about it speaks of quality and care.




Emma had a clear idea of what she wanted for the cover, in keeping with The Emma Press brand: the press’s pamphlets are distinctly recognisable and it was important that the cover of First fox be obviously part of The Emma Press stable. I had been given carte blanche for the interior illustrations, beside their having to be black and white, but the brief for the cover was very specific. Essentially, I had to leave space for the text that, along with the typesetting, was done by The Emma Press. But when it came to the image itself, Leanne felt so strongly drawn to one of the illustrations intended for the interior that it became the cover and what should have been the cover illustration went inside. I work in brown ink, so Emma changed the colour to the specific shade of indigo she had in mind. From the start, Emma communicated so well her clarity of vision for Leanne’s book that I had complete trust in her. It was really a dream job.







N: How do you blend your practices (art vs writing). Is it hard to have enough time for both?




R: I don’t see it as art v writing; it’s all art. Words are fast for me to put down but take effort from the reader to decode. Visual art is a vastly slower practice but I think it can be decoded easier – humans communicated with images before written language, so maybe it accesses a more primal part of the brain? I feel visual art is a necessary part of my language tool box, though I haven’t always had the home circumstances for it. Until recently my practices had a preferred order of works within a day. For eg, poetry on waking, revising, new writing, editing in the evening, drawing or painting and poetry. But the graphic biography requires up to twelve hours drawing per day, interspersed with research and writing – deadline looming – so I’m missing story and poetry writing, and when I finish this biography I’ll throw myself at them. There’s never enough time. My working-class background has never accommodated my artistic ambitions. Add motherhood and you’re left aching for a room of one’s own. Constraints can be more productive than opportunities, luckily.  

N: You both write short stories and flash. There is a lot of debate (and some disgruntlement) about the definition of flash fiction. Do you have a favourite definition, or a personal way of defining flash that makes sense to you?

L: For me, short stories are are built up in layers; whilst flash fiction relies more on gaps. This is what attracts me to flash - how small the stories seem, yet what vast spaces they can conjure for the imagination to roam in. With short stories it’s almost the reverse, instead of this outward roaming I feel more more absorbed into the story as I sink into the layers.

R: I think definitions can be limiting more than helpful, and worse, sometimes cliquey. It’s the nature of the categorising endeavour: as soon as you put something into a box, something else is pushed outside it. I write stories, they take whatever shapes and forms best suited to their telling. I don’t want to get caught up in semantics.

N: First Fox is published by The Emma Press. You both live in New Zealand. What made you choose a small English publisher for this book?

L: I’d long been a fan of Emma Press’s poetry pamphlets, how fresh and vibrant they are, how beautifully produced. When their poetry pamphlet “Oils” by Stephen Sexton arrived in the mail, I stared at it for ages almost bewitched. This was exactly how I’d dreamed of having my stories published one day – in a slim volume with a stunning cover, and lovely card and paper. A while later, Emma decided to publish prose and invited submissions. I sent in a m/s of First fox and was stunned to have it accepted, alongside a m/s by Jan Carson called Postcard Stories. Some time after, Emma thought it would be lovely to have her first prose collections illustrated. She considered several artists for First fox and I was stoked when she commissioned Rae - not only a fabulous artist, but one who knows this country’s landscapes, trees and plants that feature in most of the stories. Then a final magic touch, Emma coincidentally chose a similar rich blue for the cover that she’d used for “Oils.”.

R: See next Q.

N: How healthy is the New Zealand small press scene?

L: There are quite a few small presses in NZ producing beautiful work such as these two recent poetry collections which I treasure: Elizabeth Morton’s Wolf published by Mākaro Press; and Anahera Gildea’s Poroporaki from Seraph Press.

R: There are numerous university presses that give priority to writers within their institutions or specific regions, then there’s a smattering of niche publishers. I think the nature of these can be determined by the fact that indigenous and Pasifika writers turn to publishers that necessarily publish only works by indigenous and Pasifika writers.

N: Which short fiction writers make you think, ‘Yes!’?

L: Grace Paley, Lucia Berlin, Katherine Mansfield.

R: Tina Makereti, Zadie Smith, Frances Gapper, Trisha Hanifin, Colin Barrett, Katherine Mansfield, David Constantine, Zoe Meager, Raymond Carver, Lydia Davis, and you!

N: What is your writing/creating process – morning or night; longhand or laptop?

 L: I’m happiest writing very early in the morning when the birds outside are up and busy. My stories begin as stray words and phrases scribbled on scraps of paper. When enough scraps have accumulated, I spread them out on the floor and cobble them into some kind of order. Then I start typing.

R: I like to get a story down in one go, so mid/late morning, laptop.

N: What story or flash do you love? (You know the one that begs to be re-read over and over.)

L: These past few months I’ve been returning to “The Geography of a Name” by Frankie McMillan (in My Mother and the Hungarians) and Zoë  Meager’s “Sharp Stars” (in To Carry Her Home). Both stories concern migrants. They evoke - with the lightest touch possible - losses their characters sustain as they are forced, one way or another, into new lives.

R: I go back to Mansfield’s “The Doll’s House”, Davis’ “Break It Down”, Constantine’s “Tea at the Midland”, Thisbe Nissen’s “Deer at Rest”, that I first saw mentioned in an interview you gave to Flash Frontier, I think.

N: Is there any writing advice you received that stays with you always? What one piece of advice would you offer novice writers?

L: When I’m stuck I re-read Grace Paley’s story “A Conversation with my Father” in which the narrator and her father argue about the purpose of short stories, and how to write them. I’ve also learned a great deal from several Fish Writing Courses run by Mary-Jane Holmes.

R: Paraphrasing here: 'Everything’s been written by someone but not by you' – from Nuala Ní Chonchúir. Detail what you alone can.

N: What are you working on now/what can we expect next?

L: The scraps box is filling…. more short stories are on the way.

R: I’m on the home straight of a graphic biography of Mary Taylor, Charlotte Brontë’s bestie, that I got CNZ arts funding for. I’ve a couple of short story collections and a poetry collection out on submission and I’m looking for a home for two novels. I’ve another novel outline waiting in the wings as well as poetry and stories to write.

Thank you, Leanne and Rachel, for a wonderful interview. I hope the book does really well for you both. Readers you can buy First fox here.

RTÉ CULTURE REVIEWS JOYRIDE TO JUPITER

A wonderful review from Abigail Tuite at RTÉ Culture for Joyride to Jupiter:

Nuala O'Connor writes with a true and at times spell-binding voice, and each of her nineteen short stories is so self-contained it could be a novella. 

In Consolata, Helen brings her new love Matthew to visit her widowed mother Verona. Home rekindles memories of  Helen's girllhood and afternoons spent in a beautiful orchard belonging to neighbouring nuns. Against the backdrop of a blossoming love affair, there’s an exploration of grief and memory and a shocking revelation. With a brutal and sudden one-liner O’Connor exposes the skeleton in the closet. It’s a startling announcement and the reader is left reeling.

Elsewhere themes of  singledom, inheritance and childlessness are explored, lives and promises may be unfulfilled but they are not damned. O’Connor’s characters are complex, vibrant and pleasingly unpredictable.

Napoli Abú tells the tale of two lonely hearts, tossed together as frustrated travelling companions. "Partners in the pathetic," Tara is scathing of Beatrice and her allergies, her "miniscule lips", "the dour set to her face". But Beatrice is a dark horse, not as we or Tara expected. This is what O’Connor does best, demolishing our expectations - she is the housekeeper in Room 313 wanting to "catch people doing things that are the stuff of locked doors". Her characters have lived, loved and lost, and are grappling with the way of it.

The title story, Joyride to Jupiter defiantly probes dementia and the demands of old age. The terrors that we all face are bleakly laid bare, but with courage and acceptance. American Wake is a glance into the heartbreak of the emigrant of yesteryear, while Shut Your Mouth Hélène describes the similarly dispossessed shedding their baggage - literally - en route to the new world.

The wonderful brevity of Fish - a mere two pages - will put a smile on your face, it's a quirky, feel -good nod to the tyranny of middle age. This is no-holds-barred writing, capturing the vicissitudes and spontaneity of life, it is utterly heart-warming. "When you have seen your neighbour in the raw - and he has seen you seeing him - i t cannot be undone".

Some of the characters in the 154-page collection are flawed, disillusioned, marginalised, the sexual nun, the mistress, the childless woman, even 'Jesus of Dublin' is given a voice. But above all there’s hope. You’ll come away from this collection re-adjusting your perspective, refreshed and charmed.

Joyride to Jupiter is a tonic for the soul.

FINAL STOP VIRTUAL TOUR - GIVEAWAY!

Last stop on my virtual tour for #JoyridetoJupiter today and I'm at my friend, writer Shauna Gilligan's blog. Book and spacy purse giveaway! Go here.

Jane Austen 200 - Limerick

I was in Limerick at the weekend for a #JaneAusten200 event organised by Rose Servitova, author of The Longbourn Letters: Jane Austen Afternoon Tea at 1 Pery Square. Jane died in 1817 at the appalling age of 41, hence the 200 year commemorative marking.

We had delicious cakes (blackberry & pear crumble, lemon & pineapple panacotta, tiny scones, choc pistachio) and great entertainment from costume experts, a historian who spoke about Jane's would-be fella, Tom Lefroy of Limerick. We also had a talk on tea, sweet songs from the Regency period, and the wonderful Miss Bates (of Emma fame) came to visit too.

The event was livestreamed and there are now videos of it here. Rose has many more events planned, up as far as December, so keep any eye on the Jane Austen 200 Limerick Facebook page for details. Janeites in Dublin and Cork are also having events, so there's plenty to entertain the Irish Austen-lover for the 200 year celebrations.

We stopped off in Bunratty along the way and spent the afternoon in Limerick city. Great shopping, though the plentiful charity shops are overpriced compared to my midlands home. We ate at Aroi, which was my regular spot when I did the short story project with Limerick School of Art. It was as good as I remembered. I enjoyed the Limerick City Gallery of Art, especially the gorgeous landscapes in the permanent collection. I also got a new tattoo from an amiable Gaeilgeoir from Kerry called Liam. And we stayed the night in Kilmallock, a handsome walled town with lots of intact medieval buildings.

The weather was fab and we really enjoyed exploring the friary and town gates and sweet houses. Ireland is a wonder at the best of times but when the sun shines, there's glory.