You may recall all the publicity a couple of years back when Antonia Logue received £66,000 from Bloomsbury on the strength of a brief outline of, and short chapter from, her planned debut novel.
Well, now the novel, Shadow-Box, is not just complete but due for publication, and already Stephanie Merrick of The Observer is hailing it as "a brilliant fictional interweaving of the lives of boxer Jack Johnson and the poet Mina Loy".
Jack Johnson, of course, also figures prominently in another work of fiction - Hemingway's great short story, The Light of the World, which I trust Antonia read since I mentioned it to her when she was embarking on her own book . . .
RUN by daft optimists rather than by commercial realists, literary magazines have always seemed doomed undertakings, and most of them have turned out that way. Yet where would Irish writers - and readers - have been without The Bell or Irish Writing or the Dublin Magazine, the Kilkenny Magazine, the Honest Ulsterman or Atlantis?
So I think one should always encourage (and that, translated, means buy) literary magazines of quality when they appear, and you can do just that with the new issues of two current periodicals.
Mind you, you'd better move smartly if you want to get the latest edition of College Green, as it's limited to a mere 250 copies. But it's more than worth its asking price, with a fascinating reminiscence of bohemian Dublin by Brian Boydell, affectionate recollections of the 1960s by Brendan Kennelly and fine poems by Yvonne Cullen, Robert Monroe and David Wheatley, among others. The art-work is first-class, too.
Twice the price (though that's not saying much), the fourth issue of the Stinging Fly also has good things, and in celebration (I hope not premature) of its survival to date, there'll be an evening of readings in the Irish Writers' Centre on April 21st at 8 p.m.
Orion imprint Millennium is describing as "an astonishing fiction debut" the first novel by 24-year-old Darren O'Shaughnessy, due out next week.
Born in London, Darren moved with his family to Limerick when he was six and has lived there ever since, apart from a spell back in London where he studied sociology and English.
The novel, entitled Ayuamarca, subtitled `Procession of the Dead' and further subtitled (this is getting confusing) "The City, Book 1", is set in a mythical metropolis far removed from either London or Limerick and brings together a cardinal, a gangster, Aztec mysteries and . . . oh, you'll have to read it for yourself.
With another novel, this time for teenagers, due out in October, Darren's decision to be a full-time writer is certainly matched by his industry.
Adrian Rice, poet and Abbey Press editor, will be following in the footsteps of Seamus Heaney, Paul Muldoon and Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill, when he teaches at Lenoir-Rhyne College, North Carolina, next October.
He's been named as one of this year's participants in the Ireland/US Residency Exchange Programme, selected from nominations by Irish arts organisations to the two arts councils on this island. Adrian was chosen by North Down borough council, which had already given him the Sir James Kilfeather Memorial Award for his poetry collection, Impediments.
The residency is for a month and will involve teaching at the college, as well as work with local libraries and youth groups. And it will take place just after his first full volume of poems, The Mason's Tongue, is published here.