Life
1953- ; b. Dun Laoghaire, of Irish-German parents, his mother having come
to Ireland as a governess to a Killiney family, his father being an engineer
who joined a German class and planned to bring up the family bilingually
in Irish and in German; began after school as a journalist (copy-boy);
moved to Germany and worked for a publishing company at twenty; appeared
in Faber First Fictions anthology; moveed to Berlin; novels all
set in Germany to date; Surrogate City (1990), concerning Irish
girl in Berlin searching for the father of her unborn child; written on Gael
Linn 6-month sabbatical; The Last Shot (1991), winner of Rooney
Prize 1992, concerns a love story in the final days of World War II; The
Love Test (1994) concerns the breakdown of a marriage in the time
after the fall of the Berlin wall; Dublin Where the Palm Trees Grow
(1996), stories; Headbanger (1997), a thriller set in Dublin centred
on the character of the detective Pat Coyne, a Dublin detective with
a ‘Dirty Harry’ [Clint Eastwood] streak, v. Drummer Cunningham, the crime-world ‘general’; Sad Bastard (1998),
continuing the career of Garda Pat Coyne (“Mr Suicide”), now on sick leave but drawn back in to rescue a young woman; issues The Speckled People (2003), an account of his childhood; now lives in Dublin; among judges of the Fish Story Competition, 2004; winner of the 2004 Femina Award (France).
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Works
Novels, Surrogate City (London: Faber & Faber 1990),
197pp.; The Last Shot (Faber & Faber, 1991), q.pp.; The Love Test (London: Faber & Faber 1994), 197pp.;
Headbanger (London: Secker & Warburg 1997), 230pp.;
Sad Bastard (London: Secker & Warburg 1998), 272pp.; The
Speckled People (London: Fourth Estate 2003), 298pp.
Short fiction, Dublin Where the Palm Trees Grow (London: Faber & Faber 1996), 134pp.
Miscellaneous, review of Francis Stuart reprint, Irish Times (10 Sept. 1994) [written from Berlin]; review of Michael Collins, The Feminists Go Swimming (Phoenix 1995), in Irish Times (17 Feb. 1996), p.9 [writes with compelling inaccuracy about this country ... like an Ed Wood remake of Ryan’s Daughter’]; ‘Hitler’s New Children’, review of Ingo Hassleback & Tom Reich, Führer-Ex: Memoirs of a former neo-Nazi (London: Chatto & Windus [1996]), pp.26-27.
Miscellaneous, ‘Welcome to the club’, in The Irish Times (1 May 2004) Weekend; For Jean-Marie Fiorucci, interview, in Nice-Matin (October 2004).
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Criticism
Interview in Books Ireland (March 1995).
Kathy O’Shaugnessy review of The Love Test, in Times Literary Supplement (20 Jan. 1995).
Desmond Traynor, review of Headbanger, in Books Ireland (May 1977), p.125; Katie Donovan, review of Headbanger, in Irish Times (22 March 1997); C. L. Dallat, review or Sad Bastard, in Times Literary Supplement (9 Oct. 1998) p.29.
Eileen Battersby, ‘Lake Woebegone’, review of The
Love Test, in Irish Times (24 Dec. 1994)..
David Flusfender, ‘A view from the edge of Europe’, review of Dublin Where the Palm Trees Grow, Times Literary Supplement (9 Feb. 1996), p.24.
Desmond Traynor, review of Dublin Where the Palm Trees Grow, in Books Ireland (April 1996), p.91.
John Kenny, review of Sad Bastard, in Irish Times (3 Oct. 1998).
Carlo Gébler, review of The Speckled People, in Times Literary Supplement (14 Feb. 2003), p.9.
Paula Shields, ‘Troubled Histories Interwoven in One Child’ [interview-article], in Fortnight (April 2003), p.22.
Sue Leonard, ‘A Youth of Shame and Embarrassment’ [interview-article with Hugo Hamilton], in Books Ireland (March 2003), p.45 [with photo-port.].
Sundry reviews, Kathy O’Shaugnessy reviewing The Love Test in Times Literary Supplement (20 Jan. 1995).
Desmond Traynor reviewing Headbanger in Books Ireland (May 1977).
C. L. Dallat reviewing Sad Bastard, in Times Literary Supplement (9 Oct. 1998).
Hugo Hamilton, ‘Welcome to the club', in The Irish Times, Weekend [cover feature], Saturday 1 May 2004.
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)