thank you! I love to gossip
10.03.2026 14:12
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thank you! I love to gossip
Congratulations to Gethan and her fellow nominees. Check out Water in the Desert, Fire in the Night, and also these great books:
Elaine Garvey's The Wardrobe Department
Sharon Guard's Assembling Ailish
Niamh Ni Mhaoileoin's Ordinary Saints.
tramppress.com/product/wate...
The award is managed by the Kate O'Brien Festival (also known as the Limerick Literary Festival) and it's sponsored by Bill and Denise Whelan who have recently increased it to €5,000, making it one of the bigger awards in Ireland now!
Photo of Bill Whelan, Gethan Dick and Denise Whelan in front of a painting of Kate O'Brien and a banner poster for the Kate O"brien festival. The lighting was brutal but this is the photo the Irish Times ran with.
Extract from the Irish Times book newsletter by Martin Doyle that reads: Gethan Dick has won the 2026 Kate O’Brien Award for her powerful, original and deeply moving debut novel Water in the Desert Fire in the Night, published last year by Tramp Press. She was presented with the €5,000 prize by sponsors Bill and Denise Whelan at the Belltable Theatre as part of the Limerick Literary Festival in honour of Kate O’Brien earlier this week. This year’s award attracted a record 17 submissions. The other shortlisted writers were Elaine Garvey for The Wardrobe Department; Sharon Guard for Assembling Ailish; and Niamh Ni Mhaoileoin for Ordinary Saints. Festival director Vivienne McKechnie said: “It is wonderful to see such accomplished writers and the event at this year’s festival was inspirational as we heard these writers speak eloquently and confidently about their books and the writing process. We, the judges, were taken on many different and interesting journeys. Congratulations to the shortlisted writers and huge congratulations to Gethan Dick, whose novel Water in the Desert Fire in the Night was a very worthy winner.” In an interview with The Irish Times, Dick said her novel was about “an underachieving young woman, a retired midwife and a charismatic Dubliner who set out from London after the end of the world to cycle to a sanctuary in the southern Alps. And it’s about the fact that the thing about the end of the world is that it happens all the time. “It’s about hope, hunger, gold, wolves, Streatham, Cuba, post-apocalyptic feminism, pregnancy and bicycles. It’s about the porousness of the female bodily experience, the challenges of being an empiricist with a sample size of one, what’s worth knowing and what’s worth living and the necessity of irrationality.”
Gethan Dick won the 2026 Kate O'Brien award for her funny, wild optimistic novel about a group of people on a post-apocalyptic road-trip. www.irishtimes.com/culture/book...
I was really honoured to be asked to contribute an introduction to this excellent collection of essays! It was an eye-opening opportunity to consider how much has changed since we started Tramp Press in 2014.
TOMORROW!!!!
Gethan Dick has been named the recipient of this year’s Kate O’Brien Award at the Limerick Literary Festival, for her novel Water in the Desert, Fire in the Night!
tramppress.com/gethan-dick-...
Winner of the Kate O'Brien Award at @limericklitfest.bsky.social , published by @tramppress.bsky.social - Waterin the Desert, Fire in the Night from Gethan Dick - only €10 while stocks last!
thebookshop.ie/gethan-dick-...
Huge congratulations to debut writer Gethan Dick! If you haven't picked up #WaterInTheDesertFireInTheNight this is your sign – it is *riveting* (and prize-winning!)
I thought it was excellent. Really nailed the horrible atmosphere!
I found the ending too muddy. I did enjoy his catchphrase 'Still alive, ya shit-eaters!' and have been trying to incorporate it into my everyday conversation
What did you make of The Running Man?
Two issues of WAXEN. Each one has a die-cut cardboard cover of one predominant colour, one black and one grey (there are gradients in the grey and there's a subtle sunflower pattern hidden in the black). There's a circle cut out of each cover, revealing part of a more colourful illustration inside.
Bookmail! A print contributor's copy of WAXEN, plus their first issue. I took a video too because on top of everything else, these are just gorgeous objects in themselves.
Kate O’Brien Award shortlist: Gethan Dick reads from her book Water in the Desert Fire in the Night: youtu.be/2zCQv2qHH58?...
The KOB Award 01/03 at 11.15am at the Belltable. Free event, booking required: www.limerickliteraryfestival.com
@tramppress.bsky.social
Here's wonderful debut author Gethan Dick at Libreria London last night talking all things #WaterInTheDesertFireInTheNight (which has just been shortlisted for the Kate O'Brien Award!)
We’re hiring!
More details about the position here: www.lrb.co.uk/jobs
Our latest episode of The Tolka Podcast features John Patrick McHugh reading from his piece 'Voice, voice, voice.'
We chat about self-confidence, the difference between voice and style, and what your football position says about your literary instincts ⚽️
Listen here open.spotify.com/episode/5ijO...
Every successful invention solves a common problem: washing clothes, illumination, ease of travel.
The problem A I is trying to solve is *us* - WE are the problem to tech oligarchs and corporate elite. It's all for them. They just can't say that part.
They're trying to sell us our own redundancy.
Gethan Dick is shortlisted for the Kate O’Brien Award for her debut novel Water in the Desert, Fire in the Night. It's funny and hopeful, check it out!
Dropped a bottle of Cadet Cola in Lowry's in Cornamona in the 80s and I still feel sick when I think of it exploding all over the floor
Perennial post
it can’t all just be substack, it simply cannot
My short story "The Cold Moon Crown" will be appearing in the Winter edition of WAXEN, which goes on sale February 1.
If you're into Christmas stories involving weird old-money families with skeletons in the closet, I daresay you might enjoy it.
London pals! Join Gethan Dick at Libreria bookshop to discuss her haunting debut (and one of Libreria’s Best Books of 2025) Water in the Desert Fire in the Night: 19 Feb, 6:30pm 65 Hanbury Street. TICKETS HERE: www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/stories-af...
Check out 'A 2026 Irish Book Preview' on the Mining the Dalkey Archive podcast! (Some swear words, in case you're listening at work/around your children).
dalkeyarchive.substack.com/p/a-2026-iri...
Great list!
This is fun - some nice recommendations from @chadwpost.bsky.social, and some love for @tramppress.bsky.social
podcasts.apple.com/sk/podcast/a...
It appears that this legend owns a little bookstore — and you can order books from him instead of Bezos. Link in next post.
Comics retailing legend Greg Ketter standing up to ICE in Minneapolis. Yes, that's tear gas. He's 70 years old.