Date: Saturday 30th May 2026

Venue: St John’s Theatre & Arts Centre

Time: 5.30 PM

Imagining Worlds and Inventing Realities

We are delighted to welcome back to Listowel, twice winner of our Kerry Irish Novel of the Year for Shade and Mistaken, author Neil Jordan. He will discuss his latest novel. The Library of Traumatic Memory, the first literary science fiction novel from the visionary director of. The Crying Game, Michael Collins and The Butcher Boy. Set in 2084, Christian Cartwright, a quiet librarian at the Huxley Institute archives traumatic memories and, after the mysterious death of his lover Isolde, risks everything by resurrecting her as a digital consciousness to uncover a deeper conspiracy.

Novelist and short story writer, Keith Ridgway is regarded as one of Ireland’s most distinctive literary voices .His debut novel The Long Falling won the prestigious Prix Femina Étranger and Standard Time which won the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature. Today, he presents Dooneen, his dreamlike and inventive novel of dislocation, alternate Dublin realities, and insurgent possibilities.

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Date: Saturday 30th May 2026

Venue: Plaza Hall

Time: 5 PM

An Evening with Liz Nugent & Claire Coughlan

Join two of Ireland’s most compelling crime writers for a gripping evening of conversation exploring their latest novels—stories of secrets, consequences, and the dark undercurrents of seemingly ordinary lives.

Liz Nugent’s sixth novel, The Truth About Ruby Cooper is centred around the repercussions of a rape. Set between Boston and Dublin, this haunting novel traces the devastating after math that ripples across decades, shaping—and shattering—lives. Liz Nugent’s previous novels have each been Number One bestsellers and she has won five Irish Book Awards, as well as the James Joyce Medal for Literature. She lives in Dublin.

The new atmospheric mystery from Claire Coughlan, Among the Ruins is a beautifully written tale about one woman’s need to find the truth, whatever the cost. In Dublin, 1970, journalist Nicoletta Sarto balances career and motherhood while investigating the mysterious death of Helen Leonard and the vanished nurse who inherited everything. Claire Coughlan’s debut novel, Where They Lie, was published in 2024 and shortlisted for the An Post Irish Crime Novel of the Year award.

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Date: Saturday 30th May 2026

Venue: Listowel Arms Hotel Main Room

Time: 3.30 PM

This Is Also a Love Story

From the Orwell Prize-winning author, This Is Also a Love Story chronicles both the astonishing acts of bravery that love inspires, as well as the touchingly ordinary connections people make in extraordinary times. Her book is a powerful account of human resilience in an era defined by crisis—war, displacement, climate collapse and inequality—drawing on Hayden’s reporting from some of the darkest moments of our time.

Sally Hayden is an award-winning journalist, photographer, author and an international correspondent for the Irish Times. Her first book, My Fourth Time, We Drowned won the Orwell Prize for Political Writing, the An Post Irish Book of the Year Award, the Michel Déon Prize and was shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction.                                   

Sally will be in conversation with Senior International Journalist from the Guardian Julian Borger.

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Venue: St John’s Theatre & Arts Centre

Time: 2.30 PM

A Beautiful Loan
Join us for a literary reflection with Irish writer Mary Costello, known for her luminous prose and deeply human storytelling, as she discusses her latest work, A Beautiful Loan. Set in 1980s Dublin, A Beautiful Loan follows Anna’s strained marriage to her older husband, Peter. After a devastating miscarriage and his cold refusal of support, Anna reflects on the inherited suffering of Irish women. Yet the novel is not only about loss—it is also about breaking cycles, reclaiming the self, and finding the possibility of renewal.

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