Saturday, April 23, sees the Cork launch of Prosperity Drive along with William Wall’s new short story collection, Hearing Voices, Seeing Things. The publication celebration – as it is billed – will round off a week of international book events in Cork’s World Book Fest and will be introduced by UCC’s Frank O’Connor scholar, Dr Hilary Lennon. William and I will be reading and may be asked a few questions. Wine will be free but books will be sold for ready cash. The event is on at 8pm in Triskel Christchurch, Cork. All welcome!
Meanwhile, Prosperity Drive has been getting some great reviews. Clare Kilroy in The Guardian (April 9) compares the collection to Joyce’s Dubliners – I’ll take that!
“Much of the considerable power of Morrissy’s prose lies in her technique of dipping seamlessly in and out of temps perdu,” Kilroy writes. “The compassion, immediacy, humour and delicacy with which Morrissy depicts their [the characters’] predicaments result in moments of profundity.”
Anne Cunningham in the Irish Independent (April 4) describes Prosperity Drive as close to both John Banville and Alice Munro: “Her style, her intense moments of close clinical dissection reminds me a little of John Banville. But she shows more compassion for her cast of characters, perhaps not unlike Alice Munro. All human life is there on Prosperity Drive. . .It’s not a pretty picture. But it’s a magnificent read.”
mary morrissy 