Pre-Christmas Launch and Oíche Airneáil at Ráth Mór

Writer Conor Bowman at the cemetery in Castlepollard Mother & Baby Home, where he was born

COLMCILLE PRESS is hosting a pre-Christmas  launch and Oíche Airneáil at Ráth Mór’s Hive Studios on Friday, December 5.

Proceedings will open at 5.30pm with the launch of ‘The Half-Life of Edith Hopkins and Other Stories’, new fiction collection centring on the Tuam Mother & Baby Home, penned by barrister Conor Bowman. 

Following on from this, the guitar virtuoso and recent author, Colum Arbuckle, and his guests will serve up music and chat.

Then, for those out searching for that special Christmas gift, there’ll be a chance to get signed copies of books by authors from the Colmcille Press stable, many of whom will be in attendance.

Work published by CCP in 2025 includes: Felicity McCall’s short-story collection, ‘What We Did on Our Holidays’; Colum Arbuckle’s memoir, ‘Radio, Romance & Rock’n’Roll’; Paul Laughlin’s poetry collection, ‘Dorn San Aer: Filíocht ó Dhoire go Gaza’; ‘Flight of the Swallows: Journeys of Lived Experiences’ by the Foyle Foodbank;  Paul Gosling’s political critique, ‘A New Ireland, A New Union: A Five Year Review’; The Handy Wee Derry Quiz Book (edited by Garbhán Downey & Joseph Martin); and Deirdre Devine’s new collection, ‘Carrying Light: A Life in Poetry’. 

All these titles and dozens more – and, of course, Conor Bowman’s new collection – will be available to purchase on the night.

Proceedings get underway at 5.30pm, admission is free, and light refreshments will be provided.

Conor Bowman SC is a highly-acclaimed writer with nine titles under his belt including one in Irish. 'The Half-Life of Edith Hopkin and Other Stories' begins with a novella (the title story), which tells of a teenaged mother whose infant baby is removed from her at the Tuam home in the 1960s and how her life unfolds in the aftermath. It is a nuanced, compassionate and elegant tale, made more significant by the fact that the author himself was born in the Castlepollard Manor Mother & Baby Home in 1965. 

Full interview with Conor Bowman by Garrett Hargan from the Belfast Telegraph, November 24, 2025 here.

BUY THE BOOK

Handy Wee Quiz Book now in stock

The new Handy Wee Derry Quiz Book, containing hundreds of questions in dozens of categories, will give you and the quiz-lovers in your family hours of fun this Christmas - and possibly the odd dispute or two!

For those who love the North West, there are sections on its ancient and modern history, saints and scholars, entertainers and sports stars, important visitors and dear departed friends.

It's not just Derry, either - Inishowen, Tirconnell and North Tyrone also feature large too. And for those who enjoy variety in their quizzes, there are of course picture rounds, Who am I rounds and Ten-sion rounds

Priced just a tenner - the Handy Wee Derry Quiz Book has landed back from the printers in record time and will be in the shops from the end of the week.

Order your copy today from Colmcille Press, or pick up one from your local bookshop. The perfect stocking filler!

Order Here

Full house at Derry Central Library for Felicity McCall's 'Holiday' offering

A section of the packed audience at the launch of Felicity McCall's What We Did on Our Holidays, captured by Bernie Mullen.

Scores of writers, readers, journalists, trade union activists, friends and relatives of Felicity McCall descended on Derry's Central Library on Saturday November 15th for the launch of her new short story collection What We Did on Our Holidays. (Derry News photo-spread here)

The book was launched by Jim Simpson (True Colours) another Derry-based writer whom  we’ve had the great fortune and pleasure to work with at Colmcille Press. He was an ideal choice to interrogate this masterful collection - a creator and craftsman in his own right, with a calm, reflective wisdom.

Jim interviewed Felicity about her life and her writing, which the author interspersed with readings from the new collection.

Introducing the event, Colmcille Press director Garbhán Downey said: "Felicity has served this region - in tough times and in good - as a diligent reporter and honest commentator; as a producer and editor; as a fiction writer, a screen-writer, and a playwright; as a campaigner; and, crucially, as a generous mentor, to many of us who might never have made the mark without her quiet help and guidance.

"We hear these various voices from Felicity - and many more - in What We Did on Our Holidays, an exceptional work of creative fiction – a book which is also, perhaps, a more personal and powerful memoir than anything I have ever read. For, Felicity is a writer, one of those happy few, who has decided to leave it all on the page.

"Felicity uses fiction to bare truths that others would never want to see printed. She uses it as a spotlight, not a filter. There is an honesty in this writing that is searing and sometimes even very unsettling, as happens when great writers reveal to us those truths that are not universally-acknowledged. Those truths that everyone migh prefer remain hidden. 

"But it’s not just the honesty that shines through the work. There is also an underlying compassion in this work, a self-healing, that makes even the starkest of themes - like dementia, and trauma, and catastrophic addiction - bearable and survivable, in the knowledge that there will be redemption on the other side. As she writes in her letter to her younger self at the end of the book: ‘It does get better…You will transform yourself…Fight your way out of that unhappy body and emerge.’ And as we now know - she did exactly that."

The event concluded with a questions and answers session, featuring many established authors who have worked with Felicity in writing groups in the North West - and also a contribution from her three-year-old grandson!

Speaking afterwards, a delighted Felicity said: "Thanks so much to everyone who sent good wishes, came in person and in any way supported today’s book launch- a brilliant turnout of friends from diverse areas of my life, sharing our mutual enjoyment of the power of words. Proud, humbled. grateful and happy."

What We Did on Our Holidays is available to order from the Colmcille Press shop, Waterstones and Foyle Books.

Buy the Book: £10