Claire Louise Bennett – a fine literary talent

Author Claire-Louise Bennett is not used to being in the spotlight and she’s not entirely comfortable with it.  When we meet in Kai Restaurant on the City’s Sea Road to discuss her debut collection, Pond, which can also be read as a novel, the English-born writer shies away from questions about her life. But once the conversation turns to the hauntingly lovely Pond and its central, enigmatic female character, she becomes totally animated and engaged. The strange, solitary world of her articulate, fictitious creation who lives on the West coast of Ireland is something Claire-Louise is very happy to talk about.

Claire-Louise moved here 16 years ago, after overhearing a conversation in an Indian restaurant in which Galway was described as “a medieval city with a lot of music and a lot of stars”.

There was construction work everywhere when she arrived, but “it did and still does have charm”, she says of Galway.

Now, after spending years “scrapping around, doing all sorts of things to make ends meet” so that she could focus on creating fiction, Claire-Louise is enjoying the fruits of her labour.

For more, read this week’s Connacht and City Tribune.