Ally Bunbury.
Ally Bunbury’s earliest memory is of driving round the drawing room on a little cart, smoking a candy cigarette. “I was pretending to be Alexis Carrington,” she says, talking of Joan Collins’s character in the…
Judith Mok
When Judith Mok was fifteen, she became a student at the Royal Conservatoire in the Hague. A gifted singer, she was thrilled to receive a Masterclass from Elizabeth Schwarzkopf, the diva whose voice had filled her…
Alex Dunne
Alex was brought up on a diet of fairy tales. “From the minute I was born, Mum read to me. I learned the books by heart.” As a child she rewrote tales by Enid Blyton…
Elaine Canning.
Elaine comes from a family of storytellers. “My grandmother told us imaginative stories, and my grandfather told us about his travels at sea. I believed they were true for a long time!” She started writing as…
Lucy Kelly-Desmond
Moving from England at 4 years old, Lucy always had conflicting identities. And at primary school in Greystones, County Wicklow, she befriended twins from the travelling community who were collected from school by horse and cart….
Anne Booth
When the writer Anne Booth was a child, she wanted to become a priest. As the youngest child of Irish parents, who, having emigrated to England, were strictly practising Catholics, she never rebelled. “I felt…
Oliver Darkshire.
Oliver describes his childhood as very nerdy. He loved books. As a teenager he developed narcolepsy, but it remained undiagnosed. “I would fall asleep anywhere,” he says, explaining that his condition affected his exam results,…
Rebecca Miller.
I meet Rebecca Miller in a Dublin hotel on a day when torrential rain has caused traffic gridlock. We’ve both travelled from County Wicklow and have arrived a few minutes late. We’re here to discuss Total,…
Amanda Cassidy
One of 5 children, Amanda has always written. After college she worked for JP Morgan in Dublin, and then Australia. “I was successful but not fulfilled,” she says. “I felt I should have studied communications.”…
Andrew Meehan.
Andrew Meehan has recently published his third novel. Set in Heidelberg, it charts an uneasy love affair between a German woman, Ute Pfeiffer, and Seanie Donnellan from Ireland. Both are cautious about love, and being recently…
Eugene O’Brien.
A screen, stage and Radio writer, Eugene was always into stories. “As a child I was obsessed with the cinema. I was never ever going to do anything else.” Starting out as a jobbing actor,…
David Toms.
The youngest of six children, born with a heart defect, David spent his childhood wrapped in cotton wool. “I loved football and couldn’t play it,” he says. “And there were certain amusement rides I wasn’t…