Reading

One of 12 children, John Creedon, grew up in Cork City. In 1987 he joined RTÉ Radio 1 through a public competition, and he has won both Jacob’s and PPI awards for his work with them. He currently produces and presents The John Creedon Show, a popular nightly music programme on RTÉ Radio 1.

John completed a diploma in Regional Studies at UCC and his love of
Irish folklore and culture have seen him take to the roads of Ireland to
present Creedon’s Wild Atlantic Way, Creedon’s Epic East, Creedon’s Shannon, and several of Creedon’s Atlas of Ireland series. In 2018, he spearheaded the National Treasures project, a collaboration between RTÉ and the National Museum of Ireland, which culminated in a television series and an exhibition of artefacts that celebrate the story of the nation. His first book, That Place We Call Home, was a bestseller, and his latest offering, A Treasury of Irish Folklore, is due in the shops in September 2022. John lives in his native Cork with his partner Mairead and broadcasts mainly from the local RTÉ studios. He won the Cork Person of the Year Award in 2022.

Nuala O’Connor, born in Dublin in 1970, lives in Co. Galway. Her fifth novel NORA (Harper Perennial/New Island, 2021), about Nora Barnacle, wife and muse to James Joyce, was recently published to critical acclaim in the USA, Ireland, the UK, and Germany, and is forthcoming in other languages. NORA was named a Top 10 2021 historical novel by the New York Times and the One Dublin One Book choice for 2022. Nuala curated the Love, Says Bloom exhibition at MoLI, on the Joyce family, for #Ulysses100. She is an editor at flash fiction e-zine Splonk.

The Road to Riverdance by Bill Whelan is a skilfully attuned record of one of Ireland's most famous and influential composers. This richly braided narrative follows Whelan's early musical experiences right up to the world-famous cultural phenomenon: from being enthralled by South African singers in a Limerick theatre as a child to sitting in the Gaiety pit orchestra to that seven-minute interval that changed everything. Written with an inimitable Irish sense of humour – absurdist and unexpected – he reveals the nuts, bolts, sheer effort and serendipitous meetings that formed the road to Riverdance.

Bill Whelan's most famous work, Riverdance, was composed especially for the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest interval act. As a single release, Riverdance spent 18 weeks at No. 1 in the Irish charts and was a Top Ten hit in the UK. Since then, it has played to millions of people worldwide, with the album and video topping the charts worldwide. Bill was honoured with a 1997 Grammy Award when the Riverdance record was named the 'Best Musical Show Album'.