GALLEY BEGGAR PRESS SHORT STORY PRIZE 2025/26
Ten questions with GBP Short Story Prize author Kate Barry
HELLO KATE AND CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR GBP SHORT STORY PRIZE LONGLISTING FOR ‘ALL DOGS’ HEARTS’. CAN YOU INTRODUCE THE STORY TO OUR READERS, IN TWO OR THREE SENTENCES?
Thank you! The story recounts a few weeks in the life of Lar, a man living in rural Ireland, and is set in the run-up to Christmas.
AND CAN YOU TELL US ABOUT THE INSPIRATION FOR THIS STORY, AND THE PROCESS OF WRITING IT?
The story opens with a description of a pair of shoes. The starting point was a prompt from the RTE radio series ‘The Prompt’ where well-known authors suggested prompts. ‘Imagine a pair of shoes and who might own them’ was Belinda McKeon’s prompt. I found the series after it had ended but had a go at most of the prompts. I wrote the initial draft fairly quickly and around a month later I got invaluable feedback on the story from a friend and from members of my writing group.
AS A DOG-LOVER, ‘ALL DOGS’ HEARTS’ IS QUITE A HARD STORY TO READ – IT FELT, AT TIMES, PHYSICALLY PAINFUL, AND I THINK THIS WAS PARTLY BECAUSE OF YOUR DETAILing, which was OFTEN SO SPECIFIC AND ‘REAL’. DID YOU NEED TO RESEARCH PUPPY FARMING EXTENSIVELY, TO DO THIS?
I didn’t do a whole lot of research, as I find the topic painful and distressing myself. I had read about a car boot full of puppies being discovered boarding the Larne-Stranraer ferry and that was where the idea of the puppy-farm came from. Initially, all the puppies were going to be sold at markets but I some research that revealed that the vast majority of farmed puppies are actually sold online and that people buying them often believe they are buying from a reputable breeder. Other aspects – like how the dogs become pregnant and what might happen once Christmas is over – are purely supposition.
I WANT TO ASK ABOUT LAR, AS WELL – A RICH AND COMPLICATED CHARACTER, who is doing something terrible, but is also vulnerable. WHAT DO YOU MAKE OF HIM?
Lar took shape in my head as I was writing his story rather than being a prefabricated character study. He has somehow found himself in this situation and up until this point has drifted through life without much reflection. I think his ‘job’ is contradictory as on the one hand is caring for the dogs, but in another he is participating in a cruel and unnecessary industry. He could go either way but I think there is hope for him at the end.
OK! WRITING IN GENERAL. TELL US ABOUT YOUR ROUTINES – OR LACK OF THEM.
Part of me wishes I had more time to write, but I am also afraid of what would happen if I didn’t have the busyness of life as an excuse. I’m a teacher and much of my writing is done during the summer holidays as then I can write every day and I find this is the best way to build momentum. I mostly write in the mornings, partly because I really associate the activity with a high dose of caffeine.
WRITING AND REWRITING: WHAT’S YOUR RATIO?
This has tipped much more in favour of rewriting lately. Somewhere on the lines of 1:5, if not more. The big change that has moved my writing forward is getting feedback from others and also giving other writers feedback, which I’ve learned from doing a workshop with The Stinging Fly. Even if I don’t take a particular piece of feedback on board, it gets me out of my own head and perspective, and close reading of other writers’ work has sharpened my critical eye.
WHAT’S THE WORST PIECE OF WRITING ADVICE YOU’VE EVER RECEIVED – AND THE BEST?
Hard to think of the worst – maybe ‘write what you know’? One of the best is something I heard recently from Edel Coffey – to see your work a bit like a sourdough starter. You don’t have to bake a loaf every day but you do have to feed your starter or it will starve to death.
OTHER WRITERS. TELL US ABOUT SOME YOU ESPECIALLY ADMIRE. ALSO WHAT YOU’RE READING AT THE MOMENT.
I just finished Jan Carson’s excellent The Raptures and looking forward to her new novel. Other contemporary writers whose work I admire include Danielle McLaughlin, Shane Tivenan, Sarah Waters, George Saunders, Claire Keegan, Alice Zéniter and Leeanne O’Donnell. I also love the classics and I’m reading Stendhal’s The Scarlet and the Black in French again, nearly thirty years after I read it first at university.
AND HERE’S A SPOT TO NAMECHECK ANY OTHER FAVOURITE THINGS: ARTISTS, ARTS, FILMS, CINEMAS, TV, MUSIC… WHATEVER YOU LIKE.
I’ve got no taste at all in anything except books so will skip this one! When I’m not reading I’m probably watching some reality-tv bubble-gum on Netflix. I enjoy documentaries, especially Adam Curtis’ collages for the BBC. For fictional tv to grab me it must be really good, I’m thinking The Wire, Succession, the first four series of Line of Duty. I’ll often rewatch old favourites rather than endure something cut-n-paste.
“THE HORROR OF THE BLANK PAGE.” DO YOU FEEL THAT HORROR? AND HOW WOULD YOU ADVISE OTHER WRITERS TO GET BEYOND IT?
Yes, I completely feel the horror. I wish I had advice. I think in the first instance write for yourself, out of curiosity of what will happen to the characters (a bit like in junior infants when we had to take a line for a walk). Packaging it for the consumption of others can come later.
KATE BARRY was born in 1975 in Cork, Ireland. Her work has appeared in the Sunday Tribune, Social & Personal and Metropolitan, and been broadcast on BBC Radio 4. She has twice been shortlisted for a Hennessy New Irish Writing Award and been longlisted for the Colm Tóibín Short Story Award. She is currently working on a series of short stories as part of The Stinging Fly fiction workshop. As well as writing herself, Kate loves chatting to other writers and has moderated events at various festivals including Kinsale Words by Water Festival, Dublin Book Festival and the West Cork Literary Festival.