2023 is shaping up to be a great year not only for fiction, but also for short story collections! Here are a few that I am really looking forward to.

Love in the Time Of Chaos by Rosemary Jenkinson

Arlen House, April

Following on from last year’s Marching Season,  which was shortlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize, Rosemary Jenkinson returns with her sixth collection – Love in the Time of Chaos – which again depicts a modern-day Belfast where the city’s inhabitants are trying to make sense of life in the shadow of Covid-19, Brexit and the past. I’ve had a sneak preview at this collection which showcases Jenkinson’s punchy narratives and great ear for dialogue

EYES GUTS THROAT BONES BY Moïra Fowley

W&N, April

Moïra Fowley is a Dublin-based half-Irish, half-French author of three acclaimed YA novels. This collection is her adult debut and is billed as a ‘startling and irresistibly witty collection… an exploration of all our darkest impulses and deepest fears… offering a new lens on the female body, on sex and death’. It definitely doesn’t sound boring!

PROXOPERA AND OTHER STORIES BY BENEDICT KIELY

Turnpike Books, May

I reviewed Proxopera by Benedict Kiely last year as part of Novellas in November and called it “a beautifully rendered novella, perfectly encapsulating the pain and suffering inflicted on innocent people and the landscape of Northern Ireland throughout the Troubles.” The wonderful Turnpike Books are reissuing Proxopera again this year, this time with some additional short stories, which I can’t wait to check out.

ELSEWHERE BY YAN GE

(Faber, June)
Yan Ge is the author of 13 books in Chinese, and now publishes her English-language debut, a collection of nine short stories, whose settings range from Dublin to London to Stockholm to China. While not technically Irish, Yan Ge lived in Ireland and her work has appeared in in The Stinging Fly and Being Various: New Irish Short Stories so I think we’ll just claim her for a while longer.

NIGHT MUSIC BY FERGUS CRONIN

Doire Press, April

Fergus Cronin has had quite the varied career. He studied Chemical Engineering and worked for many years in water treatment, and has also worked as an actor performing in Beckett’s Krapp’s Last Tape and giving readings of James Joyce’s Dubliners and James Plunkett’s Strumpet City for Dublin UNESCO City of Literature ‘One City One Book’ events. He’s been writing full time for a few years and this debut collection is highly anticipated following his announcement as Winner of the Maria Edgeworth Short Story Prize 2022.

THE WRITER’S TORCH: READING STORIES FROM THE BELL, Edited by Phyllis Boumans, Elke D’hoker and Declan Meade

Stinging Fly, Out Now

The Stinging Fly, one of Ireland’s leading literary magazines, chose 18 stories from the archives of Dublin’s iconic literary magazine The Bell (1940 -1954) and asked 18 contemporary writers to respond. Highlights include a story from Mary Lavin, with a response from her granddaughter, the author Kathleen MacMahon, along with contributions from writers such as Danielle McLaighlin, Anne Enright and David Park responding to the work of Elizabeth Bowen, Sean O’Faolain and Michael McLaverty.

Ireland Month Irish Literature benedict kiely fergus cronin moira fowley rosemary jenkinson short story collections the stinging fly yan ge