The Book Show S3 #11 26th April 2016 (Cúirt Festival)

This week The Book Show brings you the sea, sleep and secrets from Galway which is hosting the Cúirt International Festival of Literature.

Kirsty Logan joins Sinéad Gleeson to talk about her debut novel, The Gracekeepers (Harvill Secker). It’s a magical tale set in a dystopian future – a waterlogged world! We are introduced to the ‘Damplings’ who are the water-dwelling servants of the wealthy ‘Landlockers’ in this story which has echoes of Angela Carter or Margaret Atwood. The Gracekeeper of the title is a woman called Callanish who is in self-imposed exile on an island and who performs watery funeral rituals. When her path crosses with the floating Circus Excalibur it unleashes a story of desire, betrayal and romance. Logan discusses the novel and the stories which have inspired her and we hear a short reading from the book.

Sarah Maria Griffin, who is also taking part at Cúirt, reads a short lyrical work specially written for The Book Show on sleep paralysis – a condition which she recalls here in lucid detail. Her first book, Not Lost (New Island), is a memoir of her time in San Francisco and she will be publishing her debut novel Spare and Found Parts (Greenwillow Books) in 2017.

Patrick DeWitt’s novel The Sisters Brothers was nominated for the Man Booker Prize in 2011. His latest novel, Under Major Domo Minor (Granta) is an extravagant adventure story set in a rural world of thieves, madmen and aristocrats and Patrick joins Sinéad to discuss the novel.