Rathmines Writers Workshop launch Encounters - a collection of short fiction, stories and prose, all turning a fresh eye on events ordinary and extraordinary.  Readers will  find out, for instance,  how  Dublin City councillors learn the truth about St Patrick, about  a close encounter with a young murderer, a bolt for freedom from a family holiday,  a strange meeting in the African bush,  terrifying souvenirs in San Sebastian, robbery in a Rathmines thrift shop: only some of the encounters with humans. There's also an ingenious scam with a racehorse,  the transformation of a piece of ginger, and the reminiscences of the Derra na flann chalice, and much more.  The encounters are humorous, scary, poignant ironic and above all, unpredictable.

Launch by John Gormley, T.D. Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government.

Rathmines Town Hall, 7.30pm Thursday, November, 27th.

 

Buy the book online here

With Encounters, readers who love the short story form will be reassured. It is alive and well in this vibrant, varied and arresting fiction. Hall and Cavanaugh, Guckian and O'Connell, Conway and Clarke have pooled their talents to produce an evocative collection that is atmospheric and flicks and darts like a tongue of flame to catch the many moods of this new century. Some of the writers are already well-established on the Irish literary scene. One at least has published a novel, others are published poets. Few are first-timers in print and and the range of styles explored ensure the reader's interest is held. This is a celebration of voices which offer freshness and urgency, and suggest that the DNA line of short-story telling that began in the deepest part of our history, and was developed by Frank O'Connor and others, is moving full-tilt in the early years of the twenty-first century."

Mary O'Donnell, November 2008