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Moorehawke competition

Celine Kiernan, author of the international smash hit Moorehawke trilogy, has just announced a competition: the prize is a signed copy of The Poison Throne (UK edition), a signed copy of The Crowded Shadows (our Irish edition) and a signed copy of the conclusion to the trilogy The Rebel Prince (the Australian edition).

So what’s involved? Celine would like you to pick your ideal cast of actors to play Wynter, Christopher and Razi in a movie version of The Poison Throne: get your thinking cap on! All the details are on Celine’s blog.

Entries close on 22 June and the winner will be announced on 2 July — so the winner will have The Rebel Prince in their hands MONTHS ahead of anybody else, as well as having a pretty unique set of books. It’s a great idea by Celine, and we are really looking forward to seeing the results.

Ivan

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Two awards for O’Brien Press books.

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The Reading Association of Ireland Book Awards were presented last night at the start of their 33rd conference in St Patrick’s College, and there was a clean-sweep for O’Brien Press books. Represented on the night by Michael O’Brien (Publisher), Susan Houlden (editor), Ruth Heneghan (marketing) and myself, we were abuzz with anticipation: these awards were the first for Irish children’s books, are selected and judged by an expert panel of judges (who remain anonymous, under the terms of the awards) and are awarded every two years. Continue reading “Two awards for O’Brien Press books.”

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Award Season: time to get out our frocks!

The shortlist for the Reading Association of Ireland award has been announced. We are really excited that five of the six titles on the list are ours, and can’t wait to see which way the awards are going to go.

  • The Poison Throne by Celine Kiernan: with two Irish Book Awards nominations under its belt already and great international sales, The Moorehawke Trilogy continues with The Crowded Shadows
  • Hal’s Sleepover by Maddie Stewart: the first time that a book from one of our series for young readers (Panda Cubs, Pandas and Flyers) has been nominated for an award, which is wonderful news.
  • Move by Conor Kostick. Conor has followed huge success for Epic and Saga with this dark but hopeful contemporary fantasy.
  • Wild Dublin by Éanna Ní Lamhna. A spectacular introduction to all that nature has to offer in Ireland’s capital.
  • The Story of Ireland by Brendan O’Brien. Already an award-winner, this multi-layered, beautiful book will soon be available in a mini-edition

The very best of luck to all of our authors: the results will be announced on 24 September.

Ivan

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O’Brien Press Success on Irish Book Awards Shortlist

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The Irish Book Awards Shortlist was announced in Dublin yesterday and not one but two O’Brien Press books have been nominated!  There were nominations for Judi Curtin‘s Alice & Megan Forever and The Poison Throne by Celine Kiernan in the DAA Children’s Book of the Year Award (Senior Selection),  and The Poison Throne has also been nominated for the International Education Services Newcomer of the Year Award.

Celine Kiernan, author of The Poison Throne, is one of only two authors to be nominated in two categories (she is in great company — the other one is Sebastian Barry!), and The O’Brien Press is the only publisher to have two authors nominated in the DAA Children’s Book of the Year Award (Senior Selection).

The Shortlist announcement was covered by TV3’s Ireland AM and you can watch it here.

What makes the Irish Book Awards extra special this year is that for the first time ever, award winners will be chosen by a public vote on the Irish Book Awards website. Vote for your favourite today!

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The Poison Throne gets a White Raven

This just in from the International Youth Library: The Poison Throne has been selected for a White Ravens award for 2009: these awards are for newly published books from around the world that are considered to be especially noteworthy.

It’s a great honour for Celine Kiernan to get one for her first novel, and we’re thrilled for her. 33 titles from Ireland have made the list over the years, according to their online database: happily, this includes a good few of ours!

Ivan

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German cover for The Poison Throne

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We have just seen the cover approach being used by Heyne, the German publisher for The Poison Throne by Celine Kiernan: they are calling it “SchattenPfade” which, the internet assures me, translates as “Shade Paths”. The second book in the Moorehawke trilogy is called “The Crowded Shadows” in English, so I wonder what they’ll go with for that!?

Interestingly, while we published this as teenage fiction, the Germans are going with a dual approach — the Heyne edition (to be published this autumn) is aimed at a general audience, and a children’s/teenage edition will follow.