Beginner’s pluck: English teacher and Waterford native Rose Keating

These weird, unsettling stories in 'Oddbody' focused on the body explore themes of desire, anxiety, and shame. How far can the human form be pushed and subverted?

After graduating from UCC, Rose Keating moved to Norwich, but covid struck, so her MA in creative writing was all online. Picture: Christopher Orpen

A prolific reader, Rose has always been drawn towards horror — and as a child avidly read her mother’s collection.

“There was a lot of Stephen King, and Anne Rice,” she says.

At 12, Rose enrolled on a writing course organised by Waterford Youth Arts, and afterwards, become involved in both writing and theatre projects.

“At university I became more aware of literary fiction, and for a while I drifted away from horror, but I’m back to it now, although my tastes have become wider.”

After graduating from UCC, Rose moved to Norwich, but covid struck, so her MA in creative writing was all online.

“But I loved it. I wrote the majority of the stories in Oddbody. We met, casually, once we could.”

It was the first time I’d made writing friends — people who were going to be published.

She stayed in Norwich afterwards, waitressing and bar tending.

“But I drifted, and didn’t do much writing.”

After a year, she returned to Ireland. With stories published in literary magazines, Rose has received numerous awards including the Malcolm Bradbury Scholarship, the Curtis Brown Award, and, in 2022, an Arts Council Agility Award.

“That really helped the collection.”

Who is Rose Keating?

Date/ place of birth: 1997/ Waterford.

Education: St Angela’s, Waterford. University College Cork, English literature. “I was on the Quercus scholarship programme.” University of East Anglia, MA in creative writing prose fiction.

Home: Thailand.

Family: Mum, three brothers, lots of cousins, nieces and nephews, and family dog, Lexi. “An old, ugly mutt.”

The day job: English teacher to six to eights year olds. “It’s the first job that’s made me happy.”

In another life: “I’d like to work with animals somewhere warm out in nature.”

Favourite writers: Leonora Carrington; Lorrie Moore; Raymond Carver: Camilla Grudova; Satyaka Murata; Ernest Hemingway.

Second book: “More short stories.”

Top tip: “Read beyond what you, yourself, are writing.”

Website: www.rosekeatingwriter.wordpress.com.

Instagram: @Rose_Keating_

The debut

Oddbody

Canongate, €16.99

A woman lives, uneasily, with a ghost; an actress has parts of her cut off to gain a role. These weird, unsettling stories focused on the body explore themes of desire, anxiety, and shame. How far can the human form be pushed and subverted?

The verdict: Playful, funny, and provocative, these stories are strangely compulsive.

• Rose Keating will appear at the West Cork Literary Festival on Tuesday, July 15.