There is a piece in the Irish Times today from Arminta Wallace, where she interviews 5 debut novelists about their books. And luckily I was asked to be interviewed!

This is a little snippet of my interview…

Why did you chose this particular story? I always wanted to write a piece with a character who was lonely and on the fringes of society. Tom actually came about when I heard some voices mumbling through a wall, and I imagined this man listening in on his neighbours. I wanted to investigate how he ended up being isolated at work and isolated at home. I also wanted him to be a character who was fighting against loneliness and depression in his own peculiar way…

If you can’t get your hands on a newspaper and you want to check it out, the full interview with me and the other authors can be found in the online version of the Times at this link:

http://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/meet-the-new-wave-of-irish-literary-novelists-1.1656203?page=3

And if you are thinking to yourself – ‘Gosh, I’d like to know a bit more about that book!’  – here is the little old blurb… just for you…

Tom Stacey has moved into his neighbour’s bedsit. He wasn’t asked. It was just that the door was open and his neighbours have gone on holiday. And it is so much bigger than his own bedsit. Plus, he has a lot to think about these days. The bees for one. He hasn’t seen any but he keeps hearing them, buzzing in the fridge at work, in the overhead lights, in the test equipment in the factory where he has spent the last fifteen years of his working life. They seem to be getting louder and more insistent, and they are beginning to affect the way he goes about his business.

Then there is his search for Sarah McCarthy to worry about. Sarah was his first love when, as a teenager, he travelled around the country in the back of a horsebox with his grieving grandfather. But perhaps it is not the bees or the past which is the problem. Perhaps it is his ongoing loneliness. Twenty-two dates with Happy Couples dating agency and nothing to show bar a dent in his bank balance and several complaints about ‘eccentric behaviour’. Relationships are all about the details and there are just not enough boxes to tick in the Agency’s personal profile form.

Armed with a wax model and a list of criteria, Tom sets out on a quest to create a personal profile to find his ideal match. On his journey, he meets people just like him, warm but unable to show it, lonely and unable to remedy it, the lost, the misplaced and the damaged.

‘A Model Partner’ will be available to buy in March 2014