Irish Bestsellers 3rd October 2026

Welcome to this week's Irish bestselling books charts. We have some fabulous non-fiction in for Ireland-lovers, with Best of Ireland: An Insider Guide to the Real Ireland by Cassie Stokes at no. 4, Seeing What's Hidden: Uncovering Ireland's Ancient Ways of Knowing by Manchán Magan at no. 9, and the beautiful Unseen Ireland: The Hidden Places, History and Lore of the Wild Irish Landscape…

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Clonegal Kildavin Veteran Players Group Short Story Competition

Competition deadline: 16th November 2026 The Clonegal/Kildavin Veteran Players Group was formed in May 2013. Verteran Players Group has now six publications under its belt. "Lest We Forget" and " A Backward Glance" both of which harvested the lived experiences of older members of the community. “Walk in My Shoes” Looked at the changing nature of how livelihoods by people over several decades.

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Running Home by Teresa Doran

Author Teresa Doran describes the evolution of her novel Running Home, from an attendance at a writing course and on to publication . . . “Describe a child, whose parent has just been killed in an accident, through the eyes of an elder sibling, but do not mention the parent or that they have died.” When I unfolded the slip of paper I had randomly picked from the small box, these words I remember, practically verbatim, was my given prompt.

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In Conversation: Voices of Peace – The Gathering

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“Weather” To Set The Scene Or Tone Of A Novel, Or Not

The weather, as I write this, is wet and windy. In a literary sense, if I felt the need to include it in a story, I would describe it as “wild and raging”. My main character, the Protagonist, would also be wild and raging, if introduced in this setting; an angry being. It isn’t that the weather is hugely important or that scene-setting is hugely important; it depends on the story being told and the characters being introduced.

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Teen Citywide Read 2026

Dublin City Council is delighted to launch the Teen Citywide Read 2026, organised by Dublin City Libraries and Dublin UNESCO City of Literature, with the support of the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport. The 2026 campaign, continues a successful programme that encourages Transition Year students across the city to read for pleasure, connect with their local library and engage with contemporary Irish writing.

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Your Writing Voice: Really Useful Links by Lucy O’Callaghan

Finding your voice as a writer is less about inventing a particular style and more about discovering the way of writing that feels naturally yours. Your voice is created by many things: the words you choose, the rhythm of your sentences, your sense of humour, the details you notice, and the way you see the world. It often develops gradually, through reading widely, experimenting with different styles and, most importantly, writing regularly.

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The Expectation by A. O’Connor

Andrew O’ Connor discusses the inspiration and writing of his 17th novel The Expectation. The famine had been on my mind this past couple of years. It’s such a turning point in Irish history that as a historical author I have been naturally drawn to it. I had touched on that dark period in my 2012 novel The House…

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ISLA Festival 2026

The XV ISLA Festival, Dublin’s Irish, Spanish and Latin American literary festival, returns to Instituto Cervantes Dublin on 21 and 22 October 2026, bringing together writers and cultural voices from Ireland, Spain and Latin America for two evenings of conversations, poetry and cinema. Now in its fifteenth edition, ISLA has become an established space for cultural exchange between Irish, Spanish and Latin American literary voices, bringing different literary traditions and perspectives together in Dublin.

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Finding Your Writing Niche by Taylor Dolan

Taylor Dolan, whose new book The Adventures of Sweet Boo: Finding a Father is out now, on finding your niche as a writer. As a 90's child, we were absolutely surrounded with absurdly fun horror stories from tv to books to urban legends. Gems like "Goosebumps", "Are You Afraid of the Dark", "Beetlejuice", "Tales from The Cryptkeeper", "Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark", "The Adventures of the Bailey School Kids"---the list goes on and on.

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Diary of a Sesh Hound by Claire O’M Barry

Diary of a Sesh Hound is a story that has lived rent free in my head since my own days in college in University of Limerick - a long time ago now! I’ve been a huge reader all my life and being a Limerick woman myself, I didn’t need to travel far when I went on to study English Literature at UL.

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The Lit Festival 9th-11th October 2026

The Lit, Europe’s first youth-led festival of reading and writing returns to Waterford City for its ninth year from the 9th-11th October 2026. 28 young people from across Waterford City & County have curated and built this year’s Lit Festival with Palestine, a United Ireland and activism on their minds. Kicking off with Warrior Poet, Activist & Gaza Flotilla participant…

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Submissions Call: Ireland Chair of Poetry Pamphlet Series 2027

Submissions deadline: 29th October 2027 The Ireland Chair of Poetry Trust (ICOP), in partnership with HOWL New Irish Writing, is delighted to announce the launch of the ICOP Pamphlet Series 2027. The ICOP Pamphlet Series offers an opportunity for emerging poets who have not previously had a poetry collection or pamphlet published to have their work published as a pamphlet by HOWL New Irish Writing in Spring 2027.

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A Fragment of History

The box arrived. Personal possessions of The O'Rahilly found on his desk at the time of his untimely death...

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Short Sparks (6 weeks, online)

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David Marshall

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Everything I Wish I’d Known about Writing by Tara Crowe

Everything I Wish I’d Known about Writing: A Beginner’s Guide from a (Very Recent) Beginner Scientists sewing mice together. That’s what I heard on the radio one summer afternoon in 2018: a young mouse joined to an old one, so they shared a single blood supply. And according to the experiment, the old mouse seemed to be growing younger. I was driving at the time, but I couldn’t get the idea out of my head.

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By Next Christmas by Sharon Black

My Christmas book: a novel in nine months . . . My fourth novel with Poolbeg Books, By Next Christmas comes out this month – my fourth in four years. But this, my Christmas novel, was birthed in just nine months. Nine months from that first word on the screen to handing my final draft to my publisher. It was intense.

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Wild Atlantic Words Festival: 6th–11th October 2026

Founded in 2016, the Wild Atlantic Words literary festival aims to celebrate the literary heritage of our rugged coastline over several days of readings, recitals, debates and reflection, while also acknowledging our new and emerging writers.  The Wild Atlantic Words festival was created to provide a platform for all literary activities, celebrating the connection between the rugged Atlantic coast and the inspiration it provides for the creation of stories which help to make sense of the world and each other.

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Poetry Night with Emmet O’Brien: Performance, Chat, Q&A

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Memorial Monologues: The Path of Memory

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What Have I Done? Beginnings

It’s been fifty one years since I dropped out of university in Durban on the east coast of South Africa, to go and find out about life. Dropped out is probably egging it a bit. I didn’t get much past freshers’ week. Adventure, experience, that’s what I needed, I decided, to qualify me for my intended career as a journalist.

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The Kish Lighthouse Keeper

Iceapelago 3, the final book in my climate fiction trilogy won a READERS FAVORITE award. And the sequel, The Kish Lighthouse Keeper, is scheduled for publication in January. I have started work on the fifth book... Here's the blurb for Iceapelago 3: A decade after the Big Storm climatic conditions improved gradually in Iceapelago. The third generation of survivors faced a different set of challenges as improving temperate weather prevailed.

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Geraint M Jones

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Irish Bestsellers 26th September 2026

Welcome to this week's Irish bestselling books where non-fiction and children's titles have really made a splash this week. In Non-Fiction, we've got All In by Peter O'Mahony and Not the Perfect Victim by Nikita Hand, both straight in at nos. 3 and 4 respectively. And while Gruffalo Granny, not unexpectedly, continues to dominate the top of the charts, we're thrilled that another Irish children's author has also hit the Top 20 on release, with this week's featured book, …

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Geraint M Jones

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Black & Irish: Awesome Icons Launch

After the terrific success of Black & Irish: Legends, Trailblazers & Everyday Heroes – winner of Teen & YA Book of the Year at the An Post Irish Book Awards – a lot of people asked publishers Little Island if they would consider doing a version for younger readers too. One that could let younger Black Irish kids feel seen, and contribute to making Irish primary schools more accepting and inclusive places.

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Gerald Griffin Competition for First Adult Fiction Winner Announced

Limerick Writers' Centre have announced the winner of the Gerald Griffin Competition for First Adult Fiction 2026. The atmosphere was one of celebration and literary promise at The People's Museum of Limerick on Friday, 25th September, as the winner of the 2026 Gerald Griffin Competition for First Adult Fiction was announced. Joan Cronin Joan Cronin, a Kerry-born writer now living in East Cork, was named the winner for her novel…

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Working-Class Britain Reads

Working-class Britain reads – so why is it missing from the story of Britain's reading crisis? As Britain battles a national decline in reading, The Bee is challenging one of the assumptions at the heart of the debate: that working-class people simply don't read. The literary magazine, published by New Writing North, argues that millions of working-class readers risk being overlooked because their reading habits do not always fit the conventional picture of book culture.

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Nymphs and Bullets by Donka Kostadinova

1. My hometown Plovdiv is the oldest inhabited city in Europe. It used to sit on nine hills, now only six. When the seventh hill was destroyed, its rocks, like a crawling stone serpent, paved the city streets. One of these streets is in Kapana, a pedestrian district in the heart of the city boasting art galleries and craft workshops.

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