Sheila Armstrong is a writer from the north-west of Ireland. She is the author of How To Gut A Fish (2022), a collection of short stories, and two novels, Falling Animals (2023) and The Red Mouth (in print). Her work has been translated into over ten languages and nominated for the Irish Book Awards, the Society of Authors Awards, the Kate O’Brien Award, the Edge Hill Prize, the RSL Ondaatje Prize and the European Union Prize for Literature.

Michelle Gallen was born in Northern Ireland in the mid-1970s and grew up during the Troubles a few miles from the border between what she was told was the “Free” State and the “United” Kingdom. Her debut novel, Big Girl, Small Town(2020) was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award. Her critically acclaimed second novel, Factory Girls (2022), won the Comedy Women in Print award and was shortlisted for the RSL Encore Award. Both books are being adapted for TV. She has just finished her third novel, China Bull.