The friends of a woman with a rare disease have organised a day-long festival to raise money for her life-changing surgery.

Journalist and author Gay Talese has been setting the standard for writers on and off the page for almost 50 year

Relatives shrieked and sobbed uncontrollably, men and women nearly collapsed, held up by loved ones, as their grief came pouring out after 17 days of waiting for definitive word on the fate of the missing Malaysia jetliner.

While celebrations were in full flow in the Four Seasons Hotel in Dublin, Irish rugby star Jordi Murphy had no idea that his medal was in the hands of a rugby-mad granny a few miles across the city.

George O’Mahony, who has died at the age of 88, was a former company secretary of Cork Examiner Publications Ltd and a director of Thomas Crosbie and Co Ltd.

Life’s A Breeze (12A) might have Pat Shortt on its poster but Lance Daly’s (Kisses, The Halo Effect) film centres on Fionnula Flanagan’s grouchy pensioner and debutant Kelly Thornton’s sullen teenager, using the Tipperary comedian for occasional comic effect.

Poet, Leanne O’Sullivan, will read from her latest collection, The Mining Road, at the Allihies Arts Week, in Beara, West Cork on Saturday.

Olympic cycling champion Bradley Wiggins has landed yet another title - Britain’s greatest living wit.

CALLOUS thieves who detained a man and his family as his wife lay seriously ill in a hospital bed made certain of their getaway with what is believed to be a substantial sum of money by stealing their victim’s prosthetic leg in order to prevent him from following them.

Gardaí at Graiguenamanagh in Co Kilkenny have appealed for help in tracing a 15-year-old girl missing from her home for the past week.

THE novel, a surprise best seller in France, where it was first published in 2008, opens with two dramatic events: the arrival of a man, a stranger, in La Hague, a seaside village near Cherbourg, and the start of the first winter storm.

THE Government looks set to give the go-ahead to a public inquiry into the killing of Seamus Ludlow by suspected loyalist paramilitaries 32 years ago.

Charlotte Church was joined by an unusual support act when Johnny Vegas joined her to belt out a few impromptu songs in her family’s pub.

Singer Charlotte Church has been banned from sharing a bed with her rugby player lover Gavin Henson, by her grandmother.

Prince Charles is planning to bring his new wife to Northern Ireland, it emerged today.

GALWAY publicans who claim their business is falling off because of the smoking ban may have to fork out a €3,000 fine for flaunting the law and possibly face losing their licence in an open challenge to health authorities.

THE promising Movealong Bertie is one to note in heat three of the Key Entertainment Sprint Stake at Curraheen Park this evening.