#kevin-barry

#kevin-barry

Amano De Londra Miura showcased her stunning sean nós talents live on TV, putting the Irish language back on the map and highlighting its cultural importance.

You know, this story is a bit different, right? We always do the Bird-Magic thing where we combine the narratives of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson. And really, what I wanted to do with this book was just tilt the camera a little bit differently, change that perspective and zoom in on that origin story in rural Indiana in the 1970s.

GK Barry, also known as Grace Keeling, is a prominent TikTok star who gained fame during the Covid-19 pandemic, amassing over 4.1 million followers by 2024.

"I haven't heard him sing yet," Flannery confesses, in answer to the burning question, when we sit down after a rehearsal in Nuns Island theatre in Galway.

I remember seeing it in drama school. I remember being so profoundly moved by it. I remember being so frightened by the performances in terms of seeing both sides to the thing that I think for most of us is, the most alive thing in our life, which is these, like, romantic relationships and the kind of inception of those things and the death of those things.

The scenario of a debut writer receiving a six-figure sum from a major publisher is a common fantasy, but it is based on misconceptions about the writing profession.

The 24/7 grind of a politician is not for the faint-hearted as the likes of Simon Coveney and Catherine Martin will tell you. Former TDs who stood down or lost their Dáil seat at the last general election say why they haven't looked back.

In 2005, I gave an interview to The Sunday Times, in the UK, and was accurately described as having "severed all ties" with the sport. The reporter, Paul Kimmage, asked why I'd chosen imposed exile, and I told him, "For the last five or six years, the most important thing in my life has been my family. It was nothing against tennis; tennis was my love and passion, but after 30-odd years of it, I needed a break."

Karen Russell has built her literary reputation on stories that bend reality without losing emotional grounding. A Pulitzer Prize finalist and author of Swamplandia!, Russell often blends the strange and the intimate, pairing mythic elements with sharp psychological detail.

Finnegan's Wake: An Immersive Ghost Story, presented by 13th Floor Theater, plunges audience members into the beautiful, dysfunctional Finnegan-Plurabelle family. Scenic designer Treigh Buchet, lighting designer Meghan Schultz, and ephemera designer Michelle Josette Crashette transfigure the San Francisco Mint into an Irish family home on the banks of a mystical river. Audience members are free to explore the spaces before the show begins with libation in hand. When the dinner bell rings, the show commences.

The Irish government will give 2,000 artists unrestricted weekly stipends in a program officials described as a "recognition, at government level, of the important role of the arts in Irish society." After a successful three-year pilot, the Irish government made its basic income program for artists permanent. Similar pilots have been launched here in the United States, but they're supported primarily by the nonprofit sector.

From the outset, in the novel's prologue, Anna tells us she is determined to account for herself and her life. But we are to expect no ordinary narrative, concerned only with actual events, evidence-based or relying on historical data. No, Anna is interested in the climate of the psyche and the vibrations of the soul. Can it be that the very things we cannot quantify or rationalise are what make life meaningful?

Skip to main content Illustration by The New Yorker; Source photograph Michael Lionstar Listen and subscribe: Apple | Spotify | Google | Wherever You Listen Sign up to receive our weekly Books & Fiction newsletter. Joseph O'Neill reads his story Light Secrets, from the January 26, 2026, issue of the magazine. O'Neill is the author of a story collection and five novels, including Netherland, which won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction in 2009, The Dog, and Godwin, which was published in 2024.

The ghost of a previous lover is always a challenge, particularly if you (mistakenly) believe that she's actually dead. This is the unenviable situation for Lily, the protagonist of O'Farrell's second novel, who is swept off her feet by dashing architect Marcus and in short order moves in with him. Lily takes his assurances that her predecessor Sinead is no longer with us to mark a more permanent absence;

Liadan Ní Chuinn was born in Northern Ireland in 1998, the year the Good Friday Agreement ended the Troubles, the decades of violence stemming from England's occupation of Ireland. Other recent fiction about the Troubles-the novels and Trespasses , the TV show Derry Girls (all excellent)-is set firmly in the last century, relegating the violence to history. Ní Chuinn's work does the opposite: Their new book of short stories, Every One Still Her e, is set in contemporary Northern Ireland.

Cancer means that Barnes, who turns 80 on Jan. 19, will spend the rest of his life on chemotherapy drugs. Still, he says, he doesn't grieve for his aging and ailing body. "We are these creatures who come into this earth unbidden, not consulted, and we live a certain amount of time much longer than our ancestors," he says. "But because we live longer, our body begins to break down and the medical costs increase."