Programme

In Snowflake Billy reveals his hidden talent for water divining. Often seen as a ‘gift’ this ancient practice for finding water has been used all over the world in one form or other. Today water companies often use it alongside scientific equipment. Louise will discuss this ancient practice with local diviner Joe Cassidy.

Joe Cassidy has worked as a water diviner for over two decades. He is the author of the bestselling memoir The Diviner, published by Penguin Books, which reached number five in the Irish non-fiction chart on its release. Joe lives with his wife and family in Co. Kildare, where he grew up. Joe doesn’t advertise – word-of-mouth recommendations have led him to practice his ancient art all over Ireland and beyond. “Joe Cassidy’s gift is a mixture of intuition, sensitivity, and vulnerability. His book – and himself – are worth checking out” – the Irish Independent.

Louise Nealon is a writer from County Kildare. She has a degree in English literature from Trinity College Dublin and a Master’s degree in Creative Writing from Queen’s University Belfast. In 2017, she won the Cork International Short Story Competition. Her debut novel, Snowflake was released in May 2021, and won Newcomer of the Year at the An Post Book Awards. Snowflake has been translated into several languages including German, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Italian, Croatian, Slovakian and Chinese. Her short story ‘What Feminism Is,’ is currently being adapted into a short film by Pure Divilment Pictures. Louise is currently working on her second novel.

All Welcome.

Join us in Blanchardstown Library where Louise Nealon will discuss her novel Snowflake in conversation with writer Kerri Ní Dochartaigh. A story of a college student adjusting to her new life in Dublin, Snowflake explores life’s milestones, family, mental health and how we connect with others. There will be time for Q&A from the audience. Snowflake is available to borrow from Fingal Libraries.

Kerri ní Dochartaigh is a writer whose work explores ideas of emergency, interconnectedness and ecologies of care. Her most recent book Cacophony of Bone was published by Canongate in May 2023 and was longlisted for the Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing 2023.

Louise Nealon is a writer from County Kildare. She has a degree in English literature from Trinity College Dublin and a Master’s degree in Creative Writing from Queen’s University Belfast. In 2017, she won the Cork International Short Story Competition. Her debut novel, Snowflake was released in May 2021, and won Newcomer of the Year at the An Post Book Awards. Snowflake has been translated into several languages including German, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Italian, Croatian, Slovakian and Chinese. Her short story ‘What Feminism Is,’ is currently being adapted into a short film by Pure Divilment Pictures. Louise is currently working on her second novel.

Star-gazing on the farm is a shared pastime for Debbie and her uncle Billy in the novel Snowflake. Come along to Dunsink observatory for readings by the author, Louise Nealon. Staff from the observatory will be on hand to tell us about the stars and there will be music performances from harpist Siobhan Armstrong.  This event will also include a visit to the South Dome home of the Grubb telescope.

Siobhán Armstrong is one of Europe’s foremost harpists playing historical music on reconstructions of medieval to baroque harps. She performs and records with many of Europe’s most prestigious soloists, orchestras and opera companies, and also collaborates with some of Ireland’s best-known traditional-music performers. Siobhán is the founding director of The Historical Harp Society of Ireland, spearheading the international rediscovery of Ireland’s ancient harp, strung in brass wires. The debut recording of her ensemble, The Irish Consort—Music, Ireland and the Sixteenth Century—has shed light on a neglected century in Irish music, and was one of The Irish Times’ top five international Classical Music picks of 2021.

Transport can be arranged if necessary, please email cityofliterature@dublincity.ie

Tickets will be available to book from 4th April.

Jessica Doyle, UCD school of classics presents a short introduction to the Greeks and their myths in this talk including myths featured in the novel.

Dr Jessica Doyle  graduated with a PhD in Classics from UCD in 2016 and also holds an MA in Classical Studies and an MA in Archaeology, both from UCD. Before that, she graduated with a BA in English Literature and Ancient History & Archaeology from Trinity College Dublin in 2003. Jessica has taught various Classical Studies-related subjects for UCD, UCC, the Open University, and NUI Maynooth and is passionate about bringing all things classical to a wide audience.

Join us for a special evening when author Louise Nealon will be in conversation with RTE broadcaster, Rick O’Shea about her novel Snowflake, how she was inspired to write it and what interests her for future writing projects.

The night will include dramatised readings from Snowflake by Caroline Quinn as Debbie, and Steve Wall as Billy, as well as music performances from Maija Sophia.

Caroline Quinn hails from Meath and is quickly becoming well known and highly regarded for her acting, but also for writing and directing films and shorts.  Since 2020, Caroline has appeared in Dating Amber, You’ve Ruined Everything and ‘Just Us’ (Cian Hamilton) along with Warts and All (Pat Shortt) and the much anticipated feature Blurred Lines (Mark Agar).  Caroline has been seeing great success in the festival circuit after writing, directing and starring in her own pilot What Could Go Wrong.

Steve Wall is an Irish musician and actor. He is the lead singer and songwriter with legendary Irish bands The Walls and The Stunning and is rapidly building up a diverse list of film and television credits since he returned to acting in 2012. With both bands he has penned numerous hit songs: Brewing up a Storm; Half Past Two; Romeo’s on Fire; To the Bright and Shining Sun, to name just a few. On the screen, he recently featured as part of the lead cast in The English, a 6-part western series starring Emily Blunt  for BBC/Amazon. Other recent credits include the IRA man Quinn in the 2023 feature film Dead Shot (Sky Movies); Ridley Scott’s Raised by Wolves (HBO); Tin Star (Sky); Irish comedy-drama The South Westerlies (Deadpan/RTE).

Steve recently made his theatre debut John B. Keane’s Sive at the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin playing Pats Bocock.

Maija Sofia is a musician and writer from Galway. She has released two albums, True Love, which was praised in The Guardian, The Quietus and The Irish Times amongst other places, and Bath Time which was shortlisted for the Choice Award. She has toured extensively across Ireland and the UK, performing everywhere from DIY art spaces to haunted churches to opera houses and concert halls, on her own and opening for artists such as Sharon Van Etten, Julian Baker and Mega Bog. She has been commissioned to write new music by National Concert Hall, Cork Midsummer Festival, Solas Nua (Washington DC) and others, and has had her work performed by the RTE Concert Orchestra. Her writing has been published in The Stinging Fly, Banshee, The Thin Air and elsewhere.

IRISH FILM INSTITUTE  PRESENT – Educating Rita

Author Louise Nealon introduces Educating Rita (1983), a film which chimes thematically with her tale of Debbie, a young country girl navigating the social quagmire of Trinity College Dublin. The film tells of Rita, a working class hairdresser who, like Debbie, has amassed a good deal of gritty life experience before signing up for a course in English literature in an elite historical institution.

Julie Walters, in her feature film debut, created a complex character – tough and vulnerable, lippy and lovable – while Michael Caine provided a witty, deadpan foil for her more colourful moments.  Their perfectly aligned performances earned each of them  Oscar nominations and BAFTA and Golden Globe wins.

Adapted by Willy Russell from his stage play, the film explores class and privilege and the inequities of the British education system and though set in an unnamed English university, the film was shot entirely in Dublin with most of the action taking place in the hallowed handsome halls of Trinity College Dublin (UCD, Stoneybatter, Maynooth and Ringsend also stand in for various UK locations).

Director: Lewis Gilbert   Year: 1983    Running time: 110 minutes 

Cast: Michael Caine, Julie Walters, Maureen Lipman, Michael Williams

Event Update: The format of this event has changed.

Dr Harry Barry, the international bestselling author of books on mental well-being, will be in conversation with Katy Conneely from Dublin City FM’s All About Books about maintaining good mental health in times of crises. While touching on the characters in Snowflake, the focus of the event will be on triggers, coping methods and how to build resilience for when we face difficult challenges in life.

Authors, Alice Kinsella, Molly Hennigan and Louise Nealon will discuss things we learn from our mothers and grandmothers. They will refer to what has changed and what has stayed the same when it comes to how women are represented in Irish fiction and non-fiction. This discussion will be moderated by Clíona Ó Gallchoir lecturer in English, UCC and co-editor with Heather Ingram of A history of modern Irish women’s literature.

Alice Kinsella is the author of a poetry pamphlet, Sexy Fruit (Broken Sleep, 2018) and editor of Empty House: poetry and prose on the climate crisis (Doire Press, 2021). Milk (Picador, 2023) is her debut book of prose. She is an Arts Council of Ireland Next Generation Artist. She lives in Mayo with her family.

Molly Hennigan is an Irish writer and editor living in Galway. She has spent the last few years between Galway and Massachusetts, working   on her PhD. Her work has been published in The Stinging Fly, Banshee, Tolka and The Pigs Back. Her first book The Celestial Realm was nominated for the An Post Irish Book Awards Newcomer of the Year. She will be the guest non-fiction editor for Banshee for the autumn/winter issue this year and is also editing an anthology on the work of Maeve Brennan which will be published by New Island Books later this year. Molly is currently working on her first novel.

Clíona Ó Gallchoir is a senior lecturer in English at University College Cork. Her research focuses on the literature and culture of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, focusing particularly on women’s writing, Irish writing, and constructions of gender, sexuality and childhood. Her publication include A History of Modern Irish Women’s Literature (2018), co-edited with Heather Ingman, Key Irish Women Writers: Maria Edgeworth (2022), and essays and articles in European Romantic Review, Irish University Review, and Irish Literature in Transition, 1700-1780 (2020).

Join Louise Nealon in conversation with Sheila Armstrong, Olivia Fitzsimons and Aingeala Flannery as they meet to discuss the role of the sea in their lives, both on and off the page.

At the beginning of Sheila Armstrong’s Fallen Animals, a body washes up on the North-West coast of Ireland, and the search for his identity causes a ripple effect in the lives of people he would never meet. In Olivia Fitzsimon’s The Quiet Whispers Never Stop, a tumultuous relationship comes to blows on a beach in Donegal. The sea is a constant presence in Aingeala Flannery’s The Amusements, which explores the lives of the characters in the sea-side village of Tramore, while in Snowflake, Louise Nealon’s characters find solace on a fictional island of their own.

In the gorgeous space of Dún Laoghaire Rathdown’s Lexicon, the writers will meet to discuss their relationship with the sea, their literary influences and more.

Sheila Armstrong is a writer and editor from the north-west of Ireland. She is the author of two books: How To Gut A Fish (2022), a collection of short stories, and Falling Animals (2023), her debut novel. Her writing has been listed for the Society of Authors Awards, the Kate O’Brien Award, the Irish Book Awards, and the Edge Hill Prize. She is an Arts Council Next Generation Artist. 

Olivia Fitzsimons is from Northern Ireland now living in County Wicklow with her husband and two children. Her debut novel, The Quiet Whispers Never Stop (2022), was shortlisted for the Kate O’Brien and Butler Literary Awards, and named as one of the Irish Examiner Books of the Year for 2023. She is a contributing editor for The Stinging Fly.

Aingeala Flannery is an award-winning journalist, broadcaster and writer. In 2019, her short story Visiting Hours won the Harper’s Bazaar Short Story Prize. She is a former Irish Writers Centre Novel Fair winner and has twice been a finalist in the RTÉ Short Story Competition. Aingeala was awarded a Literature Bursary by the Arts Council of Ireland in 2020 and 2021. Her critically acclaimed debut The Amusements was published by Penguin Sandycove in 2022. It won both the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year at Listowel Writers’ Week and the John McGahern Prize in 2023. Aingeala holds an MFA in Creative Writing from UCD. She is working on her second novel.

Louise Nealon is a writer from County Kildare. She has a degree in English literature from Trinity College Dublin and a Master’s degree in Creative Writing from Queen’s University Belfast. In 2017, she won the Cork International Short Story Competition. Her debut novel, Snowflake was released in May 2021, and won Newcomer of the Year at the An Post Book Awards. Snowflake has been translated into several languages including German, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Italian, Croatian, Slovakian and Chinese. Her short story ‘What Feminism Is,’ is currently being adapted into a short film by Pure Divilment Pictures. Louise is currently working on her second novel.

Come down to Marrowbone Books in Dublin’s Liberties to hear Louise read a short excerpt from Snowflake with a signing afterwards.  Marrowbone Books is The Yellow Bookstore which features in the novel.

All welcome.

Snowflake: One Dublin One Book 2024 

Snowflake is a startling, honest, laugh and cry novel about growing up and leaving home, only to find that you’ve taken it with you. Debbie White is at the heart of this novel as she struggles to cope with the weirdest, most difficult parts of herself, her family and her small life. But the fierce love of the White family is never in doubt, and Debbie discovers that even the oddest of families are places of safety. Snowflake is a novel for a generation, and for everyone who’s taken those first, terrifying steps towards adulthood. The One Dublin One Book edition is published by Manilla Press (an imprint of Bonnier Books, UK).

The Author: Louise Nealon

Louise Nealon is a writer from County Kildare. She has a degree in English literature from Trinity College Dublin and a Master’s degree in Creative Writing from Queen’s University Belfast. In 2017, she won the Cork International Short Story Competition. Her debut novel, Snowflake was released in May 2021, and won Newcomer of the Year at the An Post Book Awards. Snowflake has been translated into several languages including German, Polish, Russian, Spanish, Italian, Croatian, Slovakian and Chinese. Her short story ‘What Feminism Is,’ is currently being adapted into a short film by Pure Divilment Pictures. Louise is currently working on her second novel.

Wild Swimming in Ireland with Maureen McCoy and Paul McCambridge

Sea swimming is an important theme of Louise Nealon’s book Snowflake. Join authors Maureen McCoy and Paul McCambridge as they talk about the joys of wild swimming and their forthcoming book The Complete Book of Wild Swimming in Ireland: 200 Swim Spots in Beaches, Lakes and Rivers.

Maureen McCoy, from Hillsborough, County Down, is an award-winning open-water swimmer, having swum in the sea, loughs and rock pools with her brothers since she was a small child. In 2009, just after her fortieth birthday, she fulfilled her childhood ambition to swim the English Channel. Maureen enjoys outdoor swimming throughout the year and always keeps a swimsuit in her car – just in case.

Paul McCambridge has been a photographer for over twenty-five years. He has exhibited his work nationally and has won many awards over the years. He lives in Banbridge, County Down, and sees swimming outdoors as therapy and a way to reinvigorate the body.

Join us in Maynooth Community Library for a special talk with Kildare author Louise Nealon, whose debut novel Snowflake was selected as 2024’s One Dublin One Book. This is a Dublin City Council initiative, led by Dublin City Libraries, which encourages everyone to read a book connected with the capital city during the month of April every year. Tickets for this event are limited so booking is essential.

Book Tickets Here

Join us for a special evening as we celebrate the newly commissioned anthology, Dublin, written in our hearts. A selection of its contributors will be in conversation exploring how their writing vividly captures the unique character, history, people and stories of the city. This event features Paula Meehan and Peter Sirr in conversation with Chris Morash, and Caitriona Lally, Thomas Morris and Niamh Mulvey in conversation with Aoife Barry. The night will include readings, as well as a musical performance from Ultan Conlon, an internationally acclaimed musician and one of Ireland’s finest singer-songwriters. His 2023 album, The Starlight Ballroom earned him widespread praise for nostalgic story-telling and timeless media.

Book Tickets Here

Join author Sheila Armstrong, whose writing includes the acclaimed short story collection How to Gut a Fish, as she discusses the short stories in the anthology and delves into the tradition of short story writing in Ireland. Sheila will be joined in conversation by writer Olivia Fitzsimons The Quiet Whispers Never Stop, also big fan of short story collections to discuss their favourites and discuss the stories in the anthology.

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Take a seat, surrounded by Ireland’s foremost public collection of contemporary and modern art, for a lecture on the art of Dublin. This illustrated talk will explore the wide range of artists in the Hugh Lane Gallery’s collection who were inspired by life, topography, landscape, buildings and people of Dublin. From Walter Osborme’s evocative paintings of the area around St Patrick’s cathedral to Christo’s proposed wrapped walkways project for St Stephen’s Green and more recently Mairead O’hEocha’s painting Antelope, Natural History Museum, Dublin be inspired by the city of Dublin in this illustrated talk led by Dr Anne Cormican.