Portlaoise author urges writers to enter literary competition
Author Helen Cullen from Portlaoise. Photo: Bríd O'Donovan
AS A child, Helen Cullen essentially lived in Portlaoise library.
“I count Portlaoise library as being a major part of my becoming a writer,” says the author, journalist and critic.
“I went to the library every single week and often during the week; I ran out of books so quickly.” One of Helen’s proudest moments was being granted an adult card for the library, even though she was too young, because she had run out of books in the children's section.
“So, they let me upgrade to the adult library,” she says with pride, adding: “I genuinely think I wouldn't be a writer today if I hadn't had so much exposure to books when I was little.”
Libraries are sacred places, she says, describing them as “one of the last places in the world where you can go that doesn't cost you anything, where everybody's welcome, that is such a portal to all the opportunities that life can offer”.
She adds: “I'm so grateful to have had such an amazing library when I was growing up and long live the libraries, I say.”
Raised in Portlaoise by two “amazing readers” in a “house full of books”, Helen has had quite the career trajectory. She studied Communications at DCU and worked at RTÉ 2FM for seven years, working alongside broadcasting legends Larry Gogan and Gerry Ryan.
She recalls: “I loved all the writing parts of my job. I loved writing scripts for presenters and briefs for broadcasters and any kind of comms part of my role, but I didn't really think that I was ‘creative’ in the sense of creating fiction or writing short stories or things like that.
“I had this idea that real writers were born and not made and so, if you were going to be a novelist, it would have just kind of happened, that you wouldn't be able to resist it, that it would just happen naturally.
“I'd often hear writers talking about how they'd always written stories their whole life, so it was a natural evolution. That wasn't the case for me at all. I had an instinct I wanted to write, but I didn't really think I could do it. It wasn't obvious to me how you would sit down and just write a novel.”
During this period in her life, Helen was reading a lot and dreaming of writing a novel, without really knowing how to get started.
She moved to London in 2010 and worked in marketing and events and for the BBC and Google. She eventually reached the point where the fear of not being able to write a novel was overpowered by the fear of not ever trying.
Helen did a six-month novel-writing workshop. The work she produced in it became the first draft of her debut novel, . It was later published in Ireland, the UK, Australia and South Africa by Penguin in July 2018 and published in America by Harper Collins in June 2019.
Helen earned a Best Newcomer nomination at the An Post Irish Book Awards 2018 for the novel. Her second novel, titled in Ireland and the UK and in the USA and Canada, was published in August 2020.
Her third novel, , about the extraordinary life of Maud Gonne’s daughter, is due for publication in February 2027.
Helen is also a literary critic for and a regular contributor to . She is also a Reader in Creative Writing at Brunel University of London, having completed a PhD in Creative and Critical Writing at the University of East Anglia in 2024.
She now resides in Winchester.
Through Brunel University, where she teaches, Helen plays an active hand in shaping the Nero New Writers Prize.
Part of the Nero Book Awards, a prestigious literary prize for writers in Ireland and the UK, the Nero New Writers Prize aims to discover the writing stars of the future and support their development.
Now in its second year, the competition asks entrants to submit a previously unpublished short story (a piece of fiction or narrative non-fiction) of a maximum 5,000 words.
It can be written for children or for adult audiences and should be a self-contained piece of work.
The winner of the Nero New Writers Prize will receive a cash prize of £3,000, alongside a scholarship to study for an MA in Creative Writing at Brunel and an introductory meeting with a literary agent, facilitated by the university.
“The prize also includes mentoring with someone from my faculty and an introduction to literary agents,” says Helen, adding: “It’s about the ongoing development of the writer after they win.”
Helen will judge the prize alongside Irish author Paul Murray, whose notable works include and , and Booker Prize winner Bernardine Evaristo, whose 2019 novel was an international bestseller.
What advice would Helen offer to prospective entrants? She replies: “Sometimes people feel self-conscious about their own writing voice and they think they need to sound like other writers, or famous writers or the writers they read in school.
“The more you tune in to how you actually sound in your own mind, the voice of where you come from, the voice of your family, the voice of your community, that is what actually makes your work stand out as being something really unique and special.
“I think we could really see that in the shortlist of writers last year – that there was nobody else who could have written each of those pieces.”
Helen encourages all aspiring writers in Laois to enter, saying “How amazing would it be if someone from Laois won? That would be extra special for me.” For more information on the Nero New Writers Prize, visit the Nero Book Awards website. Closing date for entries is 11 September 2026.
