Maggie Armstrong

Maggie Armstrong
Maggie Armstrong's essays and short fiction have appeared in the Dublin Review, the Stinging Fly, Banshee, the Belfield Literary Review and elsewhere.
Photo credit: Bríd O'Donovan
Old Romantics, her debut collection of stories, will be published by Tramp Press in 2024.
The book is described as “a collection of alternative romances told from a netherworld of love and disenchantment”. The stories follow the interior biography of an indistinct Dublin woman, from early adulthood into motherhood and the trials of young family life right up to the pandemic.
“Whether a catastrophic road trip, an ill-advised career move or a sinister encounter on the beach, these stories dig at the heart of what it is to be alone and alienated in your world” the publisher said. “The heroes of these escapades are thickly masked and often unreliable as they pursue each other. Love is sometimes obsessive and often delusional. Motivations are slippery, expectations are shattered, and self-knowledge is hard-won yet inevitable.”
Lisa Coen of Tramp Press added: “Old Romantics is a collection of witty and acutely observed stories from an astonishing new talent. Slippery, observant and flawed, Maggie Armstrong’s narrators navigate a world of awkward expectation and latent hostility. From bad dates that call to mind an Irish ‘Cat Person’ by Kristen Roupenian, to comically observed workplace absurdity, Maggie Armstrong is a powerful new voice in Irish fiction and we are honoured to get to work with her.”