DCU Library Creative Writing Competition 2006
Friday 9 May

(l-r) Sheila O'Flanagan with Patricia Mullins

The award ceremony for the annual DCU Library’s Creative Writing Competition was held in DCU Library on Thursday 25th May. The competition has been running for 7 years and is open to participants of adult reading and writing schemes in North Dublin. Eleven awards were presented in total, one to the winning entry and commendations to 10 others. All received certificates and book tokens. For the third year running all award recipients will return to DCU Library on June 6 to attend a creative writing workshop presented by Dr Bill Dorris, a lecturer in the School of Communications.

Our special guest for the ceremony this year was the international best selling author Sheila O’Flanagan. Before becoming a full-time writer, Sheila pursued a highly successful career in banking. She has published 12 bestsellers which have sold over a million copies and have been translated into 20 languages. She also writes a weekly business column for the Irish Times.

The award ceremony began with the presentation by the judging panel of the 10 commendations (below). Each member of the judging panel described why they had chosen the particular piece and invited the recipients to read their winning entry. Many commented afterwards about how powerful and sometimes moving it was to hear the stories and poems read aloud by their authors.

Sheila then presented the winning author with her prize and congratulated Patricia Mullins for her outstanding piece. Sheila spoke about how her own interest in writing had been fostered by her love of reading as a child. She encouraged those who did not receive an award to continue writing and she shared her own experience of being nominated for many awards but not actually winning. She told the participants that they had taken that first important step and that they should carry on from there.

Commendations were awarded to :
Oliver Burke - Alone
Lena Connolly - Memories
Shay Crawley - The old man of the road
Mary Fitzgerald - Ladies Fair
James Kilbride- A social view of a tenement area of Dublin in the 1930s "Dublin in the rare ould times"
Gerry Mac - Father / Mother
Robert 'Ruby' Murray - This order
Diarmuid O Olainn - The great dive
Bridget Power - Who are those children
Tara Wilson - Freedom