Coming a long way

Writer Billy O’Callaghan is making waves on the international literary scene with a novel set in New York. He also has new works in the pipeline. Just don’t ask him if he has any plans to leave his beloved Cork

Billy O’Callaghan: ‘I try to avoid reviews. They do you no good. You brood on them’ Pic: Clare Keogh

As he sits nursing a coffee in his hometown of Cork, author Billy O’Callaghan can’t help but offer up a wry smile at the surreal situation in which he finds himself.

Twenty years after publishing his first short story, O’Callaghan, 44, is on the verge of becoming an ‘overnight’ success, with his new novel, My Coney Island Baby, about to be published by a prestigious British publishing house, having won advance praise from ...