2011 Columbia Journal fiction prize

Annemarie Neary

February 14th, 2012

Congratulations to Annemarie Neary, who attended the first Novelists’ Club in 2009. Having gathered a slew of honours for her short stories in recent years, including winning the 2011 Columbia Journal fiction prize, she is about to publish her first novel: A Parachute in the Lime Tree.

Synopsis: Easter Tuesday 1941, and German bombers are in the air, about to attack Belfast. Oskar is an unwilling conscript whose Jewish sweetheart Elsa was forced to flee Berlin for Ireland two years before. Alienated from the Nazi state and from his own family, he has taken the fateful decision to bail out over neutral Ireland in search of her.

The unpredictable Kitty awakes in remote Dunkerin and finds a parachute caught in one of the trees on her land. When she discovers Oskar, injured and foraging for food in her kitchen, he becomes a rare and exciting secret. But Ireland during the Emergency is an uneasy place, and news of the parachute soon spreads….

Copies will be available from March 1st. To buy a copy of A Parachute in the Lime Tree directly from the publishers, click here: The History Press

More information about Annemarie on her website: Annemarie Neary.