Council’s online writing workshops

CORK County Council Library & Arts Service, with support from the Arts Council is providing a series of free online writing workshops, designed to support creative writing throughout the county.

Three new online courses, beginning on April 29th and running every Wednesday evening until late June, will offer those with an interest in poetry, fiction and the crime-writing genre an introduction to the skills and techniques used in these forms.

Criminal Intent is a 10-week crime-writing series offered by award-winning novelist and freelance journalist Declan Burke.

The Sligo-born writer’s novels Eightball Boogie, Slaughter’s Hound and Absolute Zero Cool have all been shortlisted for the crime fiction prize at the Irish Book awards.

Absolute Zero Cool won the Goldsboro Award for comic crime fiction. Declan is a former Dublin City of Literature writer-in-residence and a frequent collaborator with the Irish Writers’ Centre. Declan’s current novel is The Lammisters.

Novelist and twice former writer-in-residence with Cork County Council Library and Arts Service Denyse Woods will present A Time to Write. This writing workshop will be an exploration of narrative writing in fiction.

Denyse is the author of six novels, including Of Sea and Sand (2018), Overnight to Innsbruck and The Catalpa Tree. She has been awarded Literature Bursaries by the Arts Council of Ireland and Cork County Council. Her books have been translated into six languages.

Current Cork County Council library and arts service writer-in-residence Matthew Geden invites people interested in writing poetry to join him on an eight-week journey of exploration and learning called A Light to Transform the World.

Matthew’s poems have appeared in numerous publications both at home and abroad including Something Beginning with P, Poets of the Millennium and The Backyards of Heaven. His most recent publication,   was published by Sur Vision Books in 2020. He is co-founder of the SoundEye International Poetry Festival.

The courses are free, but places are limited. Applications are open to those over 18, by visiting corkcoco.ie/en/arts/opportunities