{"id":44676,"date":"2024-09-10T15:42:19","date_gmt":"2024-09-10T14:42:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/suffolkcommunitylibraries.co.uk\/?p=44676"},"modified":"2025-09-24T15:51:25","modified_gmt":"2025-09-24T14:51:25","slug":"meet-the-author-donal-ryan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/suffolkcommunitylibraries.co.uk\/lt\/meet-the-author-donal-ryan\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet the Author: Donal Ryan"},"content":{"rendered":"

[et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” da_disable_devices=”off|off|off” global_colors_info=”{}” da_is_popup=”off” da_exit_intent=”off” da_has_close=”on” da_alt_close=”off” da_dark_close=”off” da_not_modal=”on” da_is_singular=”off” da_with_loader=”off” da_has_shadow=”on”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”19px” text_line_height=”1.3em” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n

Photo credit: Manon Gilbart<\/p>\n

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10 September 2024<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”19px” text_line_height=”1.3em” link_font_size=”19px” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″]<\/p>\n

Donal Ryan is an award-winning Irish author, whose work has been published in over twenty languages to major critical acclaim. The Spinning Heart<\/em><\/a> won the Guardian First Book Award, the EU Prize for Literature (Ireland), and Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards; it was shortlisted for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and the Desmond Elliott Prize, and was voted ‘Irish Book of the Decade’. His fourth novel, From a Low and Quiet Sea<\/em><\/a>, was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize, shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award 2018, and won the Jean Monnet Prize for European Literature.<\/p>\n

His novel, Strange Flowers<\/em><\/a>, was voted Novel of the Year at the Irish Book Awards, and was a number one bestseller, as was his 2022 novel The Queen of Dirt Island<\/em><\/a>, which was also shortlisted for Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards. Donal’s latest book, Heart, Be at Peace<\/em><\/a> was published by Doubleday in August 2024 and is also available from the Suffolk Community Libraries catalogue<\/a>.<\/p>\n

[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”19px” text_line_height=”1.3em” link_font_size=”19px” hover_enabled=”0″ global_colors_info=”{}” sticky_enabled=”0″] <\/p>\n

What was your first introduction to the world of books and reading? Did you have books around you as a child?<\/strong><\/p>\n

My parents were ordinary rural working people, and in the eighties, like everyone else, had little or no disposable income. They did have a talent for sourcing books in cheap job lots, though, from house auctions for example, and our small house was always filled with books. My mother taught me to read before I started school. Years later, having moved to a bigger house, my parents built on a small library for their collection. Roald Dahl\u2019s Danny, the Champion of the World<\/em><\/a> was my big childhood book. It gripped me so tight I could hardly breathe, and the ending still makes me happy.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Is the story about the 47 rejections then\u202fThe Spinning Heart<\/strong><\/em><\/a>\u202fbeing picked out of a publisher’s slush pile and becoming a prize winner true?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s actually not quite true, because the number of rejections was far higher. I just happened to have 47 rejections on a file on my laptop on the day I was asked about rejections by Hilary Adam White, a journalist with the Irish Independent. If I added in the hard copy rejections (mostly single sentences on compliment slips paper-clipped to my returned manuscripts in their SAEs) and non-replies, it would have been up around a hundred. I expected that level of rejection, though. I was trying to sell two novels in 2010\/2011 when the world\u2019s wealth seemed to have been absorbed by bondholders indemnities.<\/p>\n

My first novel, The Thing About December<\/em>, which became my second published novel, was picked up by Sarah Davis-Goff, who was then an intern at The Lilliput Press. She asked her colleague Daniel Caffrey to read it. He also loved it, and they recommended it to Lilliput\u2019s owner, Antony Farrell, who agreed with them, luckily for me. When they invited me to their office in Dublin for a chat I brought my draft of The Spinning Heart<\/em> with me, and Antony offered me a two book deal. I remember sitting in my old Saab on Sitric Avenue, Stoneybatter, and crying on the phone to my wife Anne Marie. I could not believe what had just happened.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What is your writing routine?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I get up early, even though I HATE GETTING UP EARLY. I drink coffee. I complain to my dog about getting up early. She pretends to agree but she loves early rises. But then she sleeps all day. I slouch sulkily towards my office in the attic. I plug headphones into my amp and play AC\/DC and Led Zeppelin riffs for around an hour. I rearrange my books. I go back downstairs and drink more coffee. I don\u2019t eat until midday so my blood sugar starts to dip and drags my mood down with it. I lose the will to exist. I go back upstairs. I read the previous day\u2019s work. A new sentence forms itself. My mood improves. A paragraph forms. I know it\u2019s going to be okay. \u200d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Queen of Dirt Island<\/strong><\/em><\/a>\u202fhas a unique structure with each section having a one word chapter heading then 499 words of prose. How did you settle on that structure?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was in a bit of a panic because I\u2019d just spent two years writing a long, transgressive, ruminative novel that no one liked except me. I didn\u2019t have time to make any more mistakes. My grandmother sent me an idea from wherever she is in the universe, and I knew it was a good one. A house full of women. Three generations, then four. But I had to take a careful, methodical, modular approach to the novel\u2019s construction. I couldn\u2019t afford to wander off on any mad tangents. The new term at the University of Limerick where I teach creative writing was looming, and I had to have a good, workable draft finished before my days were filled again with other people\u2019s words. The idea of short, episodic chapters describing these women\u2019s lives together, lensed through a single character\u2019s eyes, seemed workable.<\/p>\n

I was inspired a bit by Evan S Connell\u2019s novels Mrs Bridge and Mr Bridge<\/em>. I also had a more romantic idea about each day of our lives being the exact same length, give or take a millisecond here or there, and in any day, anything can happen. One revolution of the earth can see you lose a parent, become a parent, meet the love of your life, meet your death. Another revolution can see you go to work, come home, watch Coronation Street, go to bed. Those revolutions are exactly equal. Some days are huge and momentous, some are ordinary, some are beautiful and unforgettable, some days change every day that follows, but every day is the exact same length.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Can you tell us a little about your latest title\u202fHeart, Be At Peace<\/strong><\/em><\/a>?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s a companion novel to my debut, The Spinning Heart<\/em>. It has the same polyphonic structure, and the same characters speak in the same sequence. The action is set a decade later. The characters inhabit an unnamed village in rural Tipperary and the nearby town of Nenagh. The main character (if a polyphonic novel can be said to have one), Bobby Mahon, is a local builder who has set himself the task of doing battle with a local drugs gang.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

You are a university lecturer in creative writing. Has this changed the way you write and experience literature?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It definitely has changed the way I write. Before I started to work with other writers, most of whom are trying to find their note and their groove, I was a bit blas\u00e9 about craft, trusting my instincts to guide me, and relying on my literary loves and heroes for creative sustenance. Teaching has forced me to objectively deconstruct my own habits and processes, and to engage in a much more concerted and thoughtful way with the business of craft. It\u2019s made me more rounded and thoughtful as a writer, and more willing to experiment. I don\u2019t think I\u2019d have written All We Shall Know, a novel narrated by a teacher pregnant with her student\u2019s child, if I hadn\u2019t spent the previous two years exhorting my classes to take risks, to push at their own boundaries.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

What’s next for you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve finished my next novel. Or a draft of it, anyway. Hopefully it\u2019ll be my next published novel, anyway. I\u2019m really happy with it, and Anne Marie really likes it, so those important hurdles are cleared, at least. I have no professional ambition. This can be a problem at times, but mostly it makes life easier. I\u2019m only ambitious for my sentences. And I love the idea of my books being read. One happy reader is worth a fortune.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

One book or piece of music that everyone should enjoy?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Plainsong<\/em><\/a>, by Kent Haruf. Beautiful, perfect. And any of Mary O\u2019Malley\u2019s poetry collections. Her latest is The Shark Factory. She will win the Nobel.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The best piece of advice you were ever given?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Always brake before a bend, never in a bend.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Can you tell us one thing about yourself that your readers may not know?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I once found a golden ticket in a Wonka Bar and won a visit to a chocolate factory.[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider _builder_version=”4.27.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_divider][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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