Norton and O’Neill’s books win at Irish book awards

LOCAL writers Graham Norton and Louise O’Neill were among the winning authors at this year’s An Post Irish Book Awards.

Doireann Ní Ghríofa own the overall book of the year, while Dara McAnulty and Sinéad Burke claimed individual category victory, with their debut books, while the Eason Novel of the Year Award was won by Donal Ryan. This year’s awards attracted a record number of votes from the Irish public, and, for the first time ever, audiences around the world were able to watch the An Post Irish Book Awards ceremony as it happened on the RTÉ website.

Clonakilty-based Louise O’Neill won the Irish Independent Crime Fiction Book of the Year for her novel, based on a fictional West Cork island, After the Silence. Graham Norton picked up the National Book Tokens Popular Fiction Book of the Year for his third novel, Home Stretch, which is also based in a fictional West Cork location.