The Lonely Voice: Short Story Introductions - Line-Up Announced!

We are delighted to announce that we have selected our four featured readers for the inaugural event in our new series, The Lonely Voice: Short Story Introductions. They are Aideen Henry, Niamh Bagnell, Mary O' Shea and Annemarie Neary.

Aideen's short story Morning Surgery was shortlisted and commended in the Aindreas McEntee Prize for Irish Medical Writers in February 2009. Her flash fiction piece School Run is forthcoming in Boyne Berries. She has just completed her first collection of short stories and her first collection of poetry, Hands moving at The Speed of Falling Snow, will be published by Salmon Poetry in April 2010.

Niamh is a member of The Lucan Writers' Group and has been a regular performance poet on the Dublin scene since last May. She read poetry on the Literary stage at Electric Picnic and on the mainstage at Castlepalooza. Her first short story to be published was printed in last year's Kay's Book, as part of the Kay McDonnell Memorial Competition run by South Dublin County Council.

Mary has published a number of stories, one a Hennessy award winner. She was runner-up in the William Trevor Short Story Award in 2008.

Annemarie has been writing for the past 10 years, but only started to 'emerge' in 2008 when she submitted a story to the Bridport Prize and was shortlisted. In the course of 2009 she won the Brian McMahon Short Stroy award at Listowel Writers' Week, was awarded third prize in The Fish International Short Story Prize and advanced to runner-up in the most recent Bridport Prize.

You can hear these four writers read their work at our inaugural event which takes place on Wednesday the 27th of January at The Irish Writers' Centre, 19 Parnell Square, from 7pm-9pm. The event is free and open to all, so do come along for what promises to be a great evening.

Finally, a big thank you to everyone who submitted. We were delighted with the volume of stories we received and the high standard of the submissions. Choosing our four readers was a difficult task, but we look forward to doing it all again next month! The Lonely Voice: Short Story Introductions will be an ongoing event, taking place on the last Wednesday of every month. Details of how to submit work for future readings can be found on our website:http://www.writerscentre.ie/html/events/atthecentre.html