The Last of the Light is a collection of memories, short stories and beautiful images from the Loop Head peninsula by Kilkee writer Marc Ó Riain.
The author aimed to capture “the images, sounds and smells, the very taste of the Loop Head peninsula”, along with “the endless play of light on the surrounding Atlantic – its birdlife, its fish, its moods, its power”.
Ó Riain says that much of the collection is written through the lens of the loss of his brother Emmet to suicide in 2012.
Loop Head lighthouse by Marc Ó Riain
Emmet “Hopper” Ryan was a much-loved fisherman and storyteller who knew every nook and cranny of the peninsula. Ó Riain, who trained as an electrician, says he was also inspired by a longing for the west Clare coast while working on the grim building sites of 1980s London.
Ó Riain’s work has been published in Southword, The Galway Review, The Sunday Tribune and included in the 2014 anthology Abandoned Darlings.
His fiction has been shortlisted for a Hennessy New Irish Writing Award and his poetry for the Gregory O’Donoghue International Poetry Prize. He holds an MA in Writing from NUI Galway, and is a part-time creative writing tutor.
“These are my identity documents,” O’Riain says in an interview with Wavelengths on his collection, which will be launched by Cllr Cillian Murphy in the Diamond Rocks Cafe, Kilkee, on Friday, August 26th.
More information on the book is on [email protected]
