Born in Dublin in 1959, DERMOT BOLGER’S nine novels include The Woman’s Daughter, The Journey Home, Father’s Music, Temptation and The Valparaiso Voyage. His debut play, The Lament for Arthur Cleary, received The Samuel Beckett Award. The author of seven volumes of poetry, he has been Playwright in Association with The Abbey Theatre, Dublin, and Writer Fellow in Trinity College, Dublin. Bolger has been a champion of new Irish writers, firstly through Raven Arts Press, which he started, and later through co-founding New Island Books. He devised and edited the best-selling collaborative novels, Finbar’s Hotel and Ladies’ Night at Finbar’s Hotel and has edited many anthologies, including The Picador Book of Contemporary Irish Fiction.