Eimear McBride

Written during her time as the inaugural fellow in the Beckett archive last year, Eimear McBride's three short, characteristically brilliant texts - collected in one work, Mouthpieces.Each text depicts a fragment of female experience, all of them told in in Eimear's vivid, original and sharp-witted style. In 'The Adminicle Exists', we hear the inner voice of a woman who saves her troubled, dangerous partner; in 'An Act of Violence', a woman is quizzed about her reaction to a man's death; in 'The Eye Machine', the character 'Eye' tells of her imprisonment, flickering through a slideshow of female stereotypes.

A MUST-READ NOVEL OF 2025 IN THE GUARDIAN, FINANCIAL TIMES, IRISH TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES, STYLIST, AND MANY OTHERS 'One of the finest writers at work today.' ANNE ENRIGHT 'McBride is a cartographer of the secret self, guiding us towards hidden treasure.' CLAIRE KILROY 'Eimear McBride does extraordinary things with language . . . she breaks every rule in the grammar book and gleefully gets away with it.' GUARDIAN 'A typical McBride work. Praise doesn't come much higher.' FINANCIAL TIMES So, all would be grand then, as far as the eye could see. Which it was, for a while. Up until the city, remembering its knives and forks, invited itself in to dine. It's 1995. Outside their grimy window, the city rushes by. But in the flat there is only Stephen and Eily. Their bodies, the tangled sheets. Unpacked boxes stacked in the kitchen and the total obsession of new love. Eighteen months later, the flat feels different. Love is merging with reality. Stephen's teenage daughter has re-appeared, while Eily has made a choice, the consequences of which she cannot outrun. Now they face a reckoning for all that's been left unspoken - emotions, secrets and ambitions. Tonight, if they are to find one another again, what must be said aloud? Love rallies against life. Time tells truths. The city changes its face.

A MUST-READ NOVEL OF 2025 IN THE GUARDIAN, FINANCIAL TIMES, IRISH TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES, STYLIST, AND MANY OTHERS'One of the finest writers at work today.' ANNE ENRIGHT'McBride is a cartographer of the secret self, guiding us towards hidden treasure.' CLAIRE KILROY'Eimear McBride does extraordinary things with language . . . she breaks every rule in the grammar book and gleefully gets away with it.' GUARDIAN'A typical McBride work. Praise doesn't come much higher.' FINANCIAL TIMESSo, all would be grand then, as far as the eye could see. Which it was, for a while. Up until the city, remembering its knives and forks, invited itself in to dine.It's 1995. Outside their grimy window, the city rushes by. But in the flat there is only Stephen and Eily. Their bodies, the tangled sheets. Unpacked boxes stacked in the kitchen and the total obsession of new love.Eighteen months later, the flat feels different. Love is merging with reality. Stephen's teenage daughter has re-appeared, while Eily has made a choice, the consequences of which she cannot outrun. Now they face a reckoning for all that's been left unspoken - emotions, secrets and ambitions. Tonight, if they are to find one another again, what must be said aloud?Love rallies against life. Time tells truths. The city changes its face.

From the winner of the Women's Prize for Fiction'Powerful . She's been here once before - but while the room hasn't changed, she is a different person now. Forever caught between check-in and check-out, she will go on to occupy other hotel rooms, from Prague to Oslo, Auckland to Austin, each as anonymous as the last.

A breathtaking award-winning novel about an extraordinary, all-consuming love affair One night an eighteen-year-old Irish girl, recently arrived in London to attend drama school, meets an older man--a well-regarded actor in his own right. While she is naive and thrilled by life in the big city, he is haunted by more than a few demons, and the clamorous relationship that ensues risks undoing them both. A captivating story of passion and innocence, joy and discovery set against the vibrant atmosphere of 1990s London over the course of a single year, The Lesser Bohemians glows with the eddies and anxieties of growing up, and the transformative intensity of a powerful new love. Winner of the James Tait Black Prize for FictionShortlisted for the International Dublin Literary AwardShortlisted for the 2016 Goldsmiths Prize Shortlisted for the 2016 Bord G is Energy Irish Book Awards Eason Novel of the Year

AN IRISH TIMES TOP 100 BEST IRISH BOOKS OF THE 21ST CENTURYWINNER OF THE JAMES TAIT BLACK MEMORIAL PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE GOLDSMITHS PRIZEThe vibrant energy of 1990s London.

The dazzling, fearless debut novel that won the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction and the book the New York Times hails as "a future classic". In scathing, furious, unforgettable prose, Eimear McBride tells the story of a young girl's devastating adolescence as she and her brother, who suffers from a brain tumor, struggle for a semblance of normalcy in the shadow of sexual abuse, denial, and chaos at home. Plunging readers inside the psyche of a girl isolated by her own dangerously confusing sexuality, pervading guilt, and unrelenting trauma, McBride's writing carries echoes of Joyce, O'Brien, and Woolf. A Girl is a Half-formed Thing is a revelatory work of fiction, a novel that instantly takes its place in the canon.

Winner of numerous literary awards including the Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction, the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize and the Goldsmiths Prize, Eimear McBride's debut novel A Girl is a Half-formed Thing plunges us into the psyche of a girl with breathtaking fury and intimacy.'Eimear McBride is a writer of remarkable power and originality.' Times Literary Supplement'An instant classic.' GuardianAdapted for the stage by Annie Ryan for The Corn Exchange, Eimear McBride's A Girl is a Half-formed Thing premiered at the Dublin Theatre Festival 2014.'Unflinching... magnificent... The narrative transposes effortlessly to the stage, as if this is where it belongs.' Guardian'One of the best stage adaptations of a novel you're likely to see.' Sunday Times

WINNER OF THE BAILEYS WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR FICTIONWINNER OF THE DESMOND ELLIOTT PRIZEKERRY GROUP IRISH NOVEL OF THE YEAR AWARDWINNER OF THE GOLDSMITHS PRIZEEimear McBride's award-winning debut novel tells the story of a young woman's relationship with her brother, and the long shadow cast by his childhood brain tumour. It is a shocking and intimate insight into the thoughts, feelings and chaotic sexuality of a vulnerable and isolated protagonist. To read A Girl is a Half-formed Thing is to plunge inside its narrator's head, experiencing her world at first hand. This isn't always comfortable - but it is always a revelation.

A New York Public Library Best Book of 2025 A most anticipated novel of 2025 in the Guardian, Financial Times, Irish Times, New Statesman, Independent, Sunday Times, and Stylist "One of the finest writers at work today."--ANNE ENRIGHT "Her prose is as haunting and moving as music."--ELIZABETH MCCRACKEN "McBride is a cartographer of the secret self, guiding us towards hidden treasure."--CLAIRE KILROY "So, all would be grand then, as far as the eye could see. Which it was, for a while. Up until the city, remembering its knives and forks, invited itself in to dine." It's 1995. Outside their grimy window, the city rushes by. But in the flat there is only Stephen and Eily. Their bodies, the tangled sheets. Unpacked boxes stacked in the kitchen and the total obsession of new love. Eighteen months later, the flat feels different. Love is merging with reality. Stephen's teenage daughter has re-appeared, while Eily has made a choice, the consequences of which she cannot outrun. Now they face a reckoning for all that's been left unspoken - emotions, secrets and ambitions. Tonight, if they are to find one another again, what must be said aloud? Love rallies against life. Time tells truths. The city changes its face.

The searing, must-read feminist essay from the author of A Girl is a Half-formed Thing 'Fearless ... A fierce and fascinating manifesto in McBride's persuasive prose' Sinéad Gleeson 'Formidable' Vogue In this galvanizing essay, Eimear McBride unpicks the contradictory forces of disgust and objectification that control and shame women. From playground taunts of 'only sluts do it' but 'virgins are frigid', to ladette culture, and the arrival of 'ironic' porn, via Debbie Harry, the Kardashians and the Catholic church - she looks at how this prejudicial messaging has played out in the past, and still surrounds us today. McBride asks - are women still damned if we do, damned if we don't? How can we give our daughters (and sons) the unbounded futures we want for them? And, in this moment of global crisis, might our gift for juggling contradiction help us to find a way forward? 'A satisfying feminist polemic' Susie Orbach 'Remarkable' Scotsman 'Eimear McBride is that old fashioned thing, a genius' Guardian

The blistering non-fiction debut from the author of the critically acclaimed A Girl is a Half-formed Thing *As heard on BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour* 'A fearless, interrogative work ... A fierce and fascinating manifesto in McBride's persuasive prose' Sinéad Gleeson 'There is something very exciting about contemplating a future for women where our disagreements about how best to live don't translate into weakness and division' Megan Nolan, New Statesman Here, Eimear McBride unpicks the contradictory forces of disgust and objectification that control and shame women. From playground taunts of 'only sluts do it' but 'virgins are frigid', to ladette culture, and the arrival of 'ironic' porn, via Debbie Harry, the Kardashians and the Catholic church - she looks at how this prejudicial messaging has played out in the past, and still surrounds us today. In this subversive essay, McBride asks - are women still damned if we do, damned if we don't? How can we give our daughters (and sons) the unbounded futures we want for them? And, in this moment of global crisis, might our gift for juggling contradiction help us to find a way forward? 'A satisfying feminist polemic' Susie Orbach 'Remarkable' Scotsman 'Eimear McBride is that old fashioned thing, a genius' Guardian

From Eimear McBride, author of the award-winning A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing, comes the beguiling travelogue of a woman in exile: from her past, her ghosts, and herself. A nameless woman enters a hotel room. She's been here once before. In the years since, the room hasn't changed, but she has. Forever caught between check-in and check-out, she will go on to occupy other hotel rooms. From Avignon to Oslo, Auckland to Austin, each is as anonymous as the last but bound by rules of her choosing. There, amid the detritus of her travels, the matchbooks, cigarettes, keys and room-service wine, she negotiates with her memories, with the men she sometimes meets, with the clich s invented to aggravate middle-aged women, with those she has lost or left behind--and with what it might mean to return home. Urgent and immersive, filled with black humour and desire, McBride's Strange Hotel is a novel of enduring emotional force.

'Engaging, modern fables with a feminist tang' Sunday TimesDARK, POTENT AND UNCANNY, HAG BURSTS WITH THE UNTOLD STORIES OF OUR ISLES, CAPTURED IN VOICES AS VARIED AS THEY ARE VIVID.Here are sisters fighting for the love of the same woman, a pregnant archaeologist unearthing impossible bones and lost children following you home. A panther runs through the forests of England and pixies prey upon violent men.From the islands of Scotland to the coast of Cornwall, the mountains of Galway to the depths of the Fens, these forgotten folktales howl, cackle and sing their way into the 21st century, wildly reimagined by some of the most exciting women writing in Britain and Ireland today. 'A thoroughly original package that has a hint of Angela Carter' The Times'Sharp writing and cleverly done' Spectator

Winner, Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction, 2014Winner, Desmond Elliott Prize, 2014Winner, Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year, 2014Winner, Goldsmiths Prize, 2013Finalist for the Folio PrizeShortlisted for the Dylan Thomas PrizeNPR's Best Books of 2014The New York Times Book Review 100 Notable Books of 2014#3 on Time Out New York's 10 best books of 2014Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, and Library Journal's Best Books of 2014Boston Globe Best Fiction of 2014Chicago Tribune Printers Row Journal Best Books of 2014Star Tribune Best Fiction of 2014Electric Literature 25 Best Novels of 2014Largehearted Boy Favorite Novels of 2014"Eimear McBride is a writer of remarkable power and originality."--The Times Literary Supplement "An instant classic."--The Guardian "It's hard to imagine another narrative that would justify this way of telling, but perhaps McBride can build another style from scratch for another style of story. That's a project for another day, when this little book is famous."--London Review of Books "In edgy, hazy, stream-of-consciousness prose, Eimear McBride transports you directly into her narrator's mind and heart, making this experimental, award-winning novel totally unforgettable."--Bustle "A Girl is a Half-formed Thing is simply a brilliant book--entirely emotionally raw and at the same time technically astounding. Her prose is as haunting and moving as music, and the love story at the heart of the novel--between a sister and brother--as true and wrenching as any in literature. This is a book about everything: family, faith, sex, home, transcendence, violence, and love. I can't recommend it highly enough."--Elizabeth McCracken "McBride's A Girl is a Half-formed Thing is a game-changer, a disruptor, a grenade of a novel, and we all agreed this had to win."--Isabel Berwick "My discovery of the year was Eimear McBride's debut novel A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing."--Eleanor Catton Eimear McBride's acclaimed debut tells the story of a young woman's relationship with her brother, and the long shadow cast by his childhood brain tumor, touching on everything from family violence to sexuality and the personal struggle to remain intact in times of intense trauma. Eimear McBride was born in 1976 and grew up in Ireland. At twenty-seven she wrote A Girl is a Half-formed Thing and spent the next nine years trying to have it published. "Perhaps no debut has been more thrilling than Eimear McBride's Girl is a Half-formed Thing."-- SF Weekly "Undoubtedly my standout read of the year, A Girl is A Half-formed Thing is an exciting and innovative debut."-- Glasgow Review of Books "Irish author Eimear McBride earned hosannas for her first novel with the very evocative 'A Girl is a Half Formed Thing'."-- Indian Express "[McBride] reframes our expectations of prose and clarifies an urgent reality: we are all half-formed, to some degree." --The Colorado Review