Launch of Boyne Readings and Open Mic

Boyne Writers Group are ready to launch their new venture: monthly readings and opem mics which will take place in the unusual setting of the Village Hall in the Knightsbridge Village on the Longwood Road in Trim, Co Meath. We have no idea how this will work out, no indication how many will come for the open mic but we think there must be a demand for it in the Meath area.

Announcing the launch, Boyne Writers Group chairman Paul Egan said they hope to attract people from a wide area – from all over Meath and from surrounding counties.

“The series is, as the name suggests, an open forum where people read their own material to other writers and to the general public,” he said. “Our own members have participated in open mics in places as far away as Galway and Limerick, and we’re excited about the prospect of having one in Meath.”

As well as an open mic session, each evening will also feature guest writers who will read from their own work. For the launch, on Thursday April 16 at 8pm, the featured readers will be Bective poet Frank Murphy and Trim-born novelist Pat Dunne.

“At the open mic, everyone is welcome to read their own work and time will be allocated according to the number of readers,” said Mr Egan. “Visitors – both readers and non-readers – are very welcome.”

The series, which will be held on the third Thursday of each month, will be known as the Boyne Readings and Open Mic. Admission is €5, which includes tea/coffee and biscuits.

The first of the featured readers, Frank Murphy, is a Meath poet who has published two books of poetry, The Marginal Line (2005) and Excursions (2008). His poems have been highly commended and shortlisted in a number of competitions and he is a member of the Meath Writers Circle since 2001. In the foreword to Excursions, Frank writes: “Poetry is a hall of mirrors in which one image is reflected in another. It is neither a lighthouse in a bog nor a messenger service. It just is.”

The other featured reader, Pat Dunne, is an internationally-selling author with four novels published to date. His first book, Die Keltennadel, was published in Germany in 2000. A Carol for the Dead, the first in a series of thrillers featuring the Meath-based archaeologist Illaun Bowe, has appeared in paperback in English and in addition has been translated into eleven other languages. Pat worked with RTE as a radio producer from 1979. He left RTE almost six years ago to pursue a lifetime's ambition and become a full-time writer.