Bridget Whelan

Born into the London Irish community within walking distance of Fleet Street, Bridget Whelan's first job was to make the tea and write a youth column for a weekly Catholic newspaper. She joined the Daily Mirror at the age of twenty and in her long career she gave welfare advice to readers, replied to the lovelorn for agony aunt Marje Proops and researched miscarriages of justice for the campaigning journalist Paul Foot.

A prize winning short story writer - she won US$4,000 in an international competition - Bridget is a graduate of Goldsmiths' Masters programme in Creative Writing. Her debut novel A Good Confession, to be published by Severn House, was completed with the support of a prestigious Arts Council Grant. Now back at her old College as a lecturer, Bridget also teaches creative writing at City Lit, one of the UK's largest centres for adult education. In addition, she is Writer in Residence at a community centre in the heart of Brighton that provides practical support to the unwaged, low waged and unemployed. A paperback anthology that grew from the residency was the subject of a two page Guardian feature and described by Blake Morrison as 'a gust of fresh sea air'.

A founder member of County Brighton Irish Society, Bridget met her husband not across a crowded Irish dance hall, but across a committee room at the Daily Mirror when they were both trade union officials. They now live on the south coast with two handsome sons and a fat cat.

News

  • Bridget Whelan's A Good Confession longlisted for the Romantic Novel of the Year Award 2009

    Bridget Whelan's A Good Confession has been longlisted for the Romantic Novel of the Year 2009, which has just been announced by the Romantic Novelists's Association. The 2009 prize will be awarded at a lunch at the Royal Garden Hotel, Kensington on February 10th to coincide with Valentine's Day. Originally read and selected by a panel of 80 readers from all over the country, aged from 20 to 70, the longlist will next be reduced to 6 novels by a panel of RNA members. The shortlist will be announced on 13th January and the winner on 10th February.

    http://www.rna-uk.org/index.php?page=article&id=155

  • Bridget Whelan at LitCamp - A writers' unconference at London Metropolitan University

    Bridget Whelan is involved in three sessions at LitCamp - A writers' unconference at London Metropolitan University on Friday 12 September 2008, 11am to 8pm. 11.30am-1pm The first page - Bridget offers a confidence-building session full of imaginative exercises to help prose writers at all levels find inspiration in the ordinary and create characters that live and breathe. 3.30-4.15pm How to make a living while you write - Bridget leads a session on how to earn a living while drafting and revising your magnum opus. 6ish-8pm The Evening Session - An eclectic mix of writers featuring: Paul Ewen, Jay Bernard, Farahad Zama, Vanessa Gebbie, Bridget Whelan, Anne Mullane, Nicholas Hogg, Maggie Butt, Bilal Ghafoor...

    http://www.litcamp.org/

  • Bridget Whelan's Good Confession to Severn House

    Bridget Whelan's debut novel A Good Confession has been sold to Severn House, who will publish in Christmas 2008. The novel traces Cathleen's relationship with Father Jerry, her dead husband's cousin, and bears comparison with Colleen McCullogh's The Thorn Birds. Bridget began the novel whilst studying for an MA in Creative Writing at Goldsmith's College, London

© Mulcahy Conway Associates Ltd, 2012