Novelist Dwyer Hickey takes top prize at festival

Novelist Christine Dwyer Hickey won the top prize of €15,000 for her latest work, The Cold Eye of Heaven, at the 41st Listowel Writers’ Week, last night.

There was tough competition for the coveted Kerry Group Irish Novel Award and the other shortlisted authors were Kevin Barry, Carlo Gébler, Anne Enright, and Belinda McKeon.

Set in Dublin, Ms Hickey’s novel tells the 75-year life story of a man and the dialogue is peppered with the accent, speech, and turn of phrase for which the capital city is noted.