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Nicole Flattery

Nicole Flattery's criticism has appeared in the GuardianThe Irish Times and the LRB. Her story collection Show Them A Good Time was published in 2019. Her favourite Chantal Akeman film is News From Home.



Articles Available Online


Chantal Akerman’s ‘My Mother Laughs’

Book Review

October 2019

Nicole Flattery

Book Review

October 2019

There’s a scene in the documentary I Don’t Belong Anywhere, about the Belgian filmmaker’s Chantal Akerman’s life and work, where she discusses her only...

Book Review

August 2018

Lorrie Moore's ‘See What Can Be Done’

Nicole Flattery

Book Review

August 2018

Lorrie Moore writes in her introduction to See What Can Be Done that, at the start of her career,...

The last fella was baby-faced with tufty brown hair and it was Majella’s turn to sit in front He’d been crapping on about what Dublin girls liked to get up to, and when she didn’t answer, he told her to cheer up outta that and let a smile out of her He took his hand off the gear stick and, before it landed on her knee, she stabbed him in the cheek with the brassy end of her lighter, yelling at him to stop the car From the back seat, Roisin bashed him on the head with her fist and the car skidded sideways onto the grass verge While they scrabbled to get out, he kept shouting, ‘What the fuck?’ Majella slammed the door and, as he screeched away, Roisin whacked her haversack off the boot They stood in the middle of the road yelling ‘wanker’ till he was out of sight    ‘That’ll learn you,’ Roisin shouted ‘Fucken prick’ Then they were both laughing, and yelling, ‘What the fuck? What the fuck?’ in his country-boy accent and mimicking his wide frightened eyes    When they’d calmed down, Roisin lit two fags and handed one to Majella They were on a strip of road with no houses, just rough, tussocky grass and hawthorn Majella sniffed the air From somewhere behind them, the smell of the sea drifted across the fields, mingled with the slight coolness of evening    ‘Fuck’s sake,’ she said ‘Middle of nowhere’   ‘It’ll be grand,’ Roisin said They stood smoking and looking around Roisin took a last drag, dropped her butt onto the road and screwed it into the tarmac with a pointed foot She picked up her haversack, her hair swinging, sleek and shiny, around her face, then walked backwards along the grass verge getting ready to stick her thumb out    ‘My turn to sit up front,’ she said ‘For me sins’   Eventually an auld lad in a filthy Ford pulled up and dropped them outside Jack Whites   Dekko was waiting for them in the car park He strolled over, looped his arms around Roisin’s neck and gave her a long,

Contributor

January 2018

Nicole Flattery

Contributor

January 2018

Nicole Flattery’s criticism has appeared in the Guardian, The Irish Times and the LRB. Her story collection Show Them A Good...

Carmen Maria Machado’s ‘Her Body and Other Parties’

Book Review

January 2018

Nicole Flattery

Book Review

January 2018

I’m reluctant to admit this but it’s often easier for me to write about a book I hated rather than a book I loved....

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feature

July 2014

Another month, another year, another crisis: eleven years in Beirut

Paul Cochrane

feature

July 2014

Rumours of impending conflict can wreak a particular type of havoc. This is not as physically manifest as the...

feature

May 2016

Postcard from Istanbul

Sydney Ribot

feature

May 2016

    Saturday       On March 19, at 1 p.m. in a café off Turnacibaşı St., an...

Prize Entry

April 2016

Oögenesis

Karina Lickorish Quinn

Prize Entry

April 2016

After her daughter had – for the third time, no less – laid her eggs in the fruit bowl,...

 

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