Workshop 1 Playing with Words with Bernie McGill

Whether you write fiction or poetry or memoir or script, we all approach writing from a different angle, drawing on our varied experiences. The aims of this workshop are to try some new exercises, experiment with prompts, allow yourself to have a bit of a play and, hopefully, leave with some new approaches and material that you can work with in the future. The emphasis is on having fun with words. Leave your grown-up at home for the day!

Bernie McGill is the 2023 winner of the Edge Hill Short Story Prize for her collection This Train is For. She is the author of two novels: The Watch House (nominated for the Ireland European Union Prize for Literature in 2019) and The Butterfly Cabinet (2010). Her work has been widely anthologised and broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4. Bernie is a Fellow with the Royal Literary Fund and a Mentor with the Irish Writers’ Centre. Her first short story collection, Sleepwalkers was re- published in 2025 by No Alibis Press. She is an Honorary Member of the Linen Hall Library in which building her writing archive is held.

Workshop 2 The Poetry of Hope with Angela Graham

Find the brightness and share it. Avoiding the pitfalls – sentimentalism, preachiness and the superficial – we’ll see how several poets have written honestly and constructively about life as it is and we’ll write our own poetry.

Angela Graham became a full-time writer after a long career making award-winning films in documentary and drama.  Angela’s poems have been published in many anthologies including the CAP Arts anthologies 2020 and 2024 drawn from entries to the Seamus Heaney Award for New Writing, and in anthologies by Dedalus Press, Arachne Press, Parthian Books, four volumes of Arlen House’s Washing Windows series of Irish women’s poetry and three of The Broken Spine’s Slimline anthologies and five from Black Bough. Her poetry collections are Exposure: war, media, democracy (2026), Star (both published by Culture & Democracy Press) and Sanctuary (Seren Books). Her short story collection is A City Burning (also Seren Books).

Your chosen workshop will run from 10.00 am to 1.00 pm (including break for tea/coffee etc.)

Lunch 1.00 pm to 2.00 pm followed by a chance for participants to read out their work.

The afternoon will round up with readings by Angela & Bernie and an opportunity to purchase their books.

The cost of the workshop is £35.00 to include light lunch and refreshments.

To book email ballycastlecreativewriters@outlook.com or WhatsApp: 07921404946