
Billy O'Callaghan was born in Cork in 1974, and is the author of two novels, The Dead House, (Brandon/O'Brien Press, 2017) and My Coney Island Baby (Jonathan Cape, 2019), and three short story collections: In Exile (Mercier Press, 2008), In Too Deep (Mercier Press, 2009), and The Things We Lose, The Things We Leave Behind (New Island Books, 2013).
Winner of the Bord Gáis Energy Irish Book Award for Short Story of the Year in 2013, and the recipient of literature bursaries from both the Arts Council and the Cork County Council, his story, 'The Boatman', was a finalist for the 2016 Costa Short Story Award.
More than one hundred of his short stories have appeared in literary journals and magazines around the world, most recently in Agni, the Chattahoochee Review, Kenyon Review, London Magazine, Ploughshares, Salamander and the Saturday Evening Post.
His new novel, My Coney Island Baby, was published by Jonathan Cape (UK) in January 2019. It is also forthcoming in the U.S. from Harper in April, and is currently being translated into eight lanuages. A new short story collection, entitled The Boatman and Other Stories, is scheduled for publication from both Jonathan Cape and Harper in 2020.
Photo credit: Hedwig Schwall
