It's about "a woman who doesn't swill chardonnay or look for Mr Right but who might meet him anyway", says Sheila Flanagan of her sixth book, My Favourite Goodbye. Her eyes twinkle knowingly. Now writing full-time, does she miss her 20-year-long career as a bond trader? "I don't miss getting up at 6 a.m.," she answers promptly. And yes, she says, she did know a lot of Gordon Gekko characters in the business. "There's a few of them here tonight," she jokes, looking over at bond traders Ciaran Duffy, Michael Grace and Marguerite Gaffney.
Other female novelists at the party in the Clarence Hotel include American writer Cristina Pisco, who writes historical romances, and Patricia Scanlan, here with her sister, Mary Bellew. Scanlan has just started a new book, and has another, Francesca's Party, out this year. The two sisters and their sister-in-law, Yvonne Scanlan, are off to New York "for research purposes" shortly, says the writer with a grin. Shopping is research.
After a while we leave because, well, there's no sign of Mr Right.