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Books Asking For It, Only Ever Yours, Louise O'Neill Profiles | ||
Louise O'Neill is an Irish author who writes primarily for young adults, with a strong focus on feminist issues. The Guardian called O'Neill "the best YA fiction writer alive today".
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O'Neill grew up in Clonakilty, a small town in West Cork, Ireland. After receiving an honours BA in English Studies from Trinity College Dublin, she went on to complete a post-graduate diploma in Fashion Buying from the Dublin Institute of Technology. She moved to New York City in 2010 and spent a year there interning as an assistant stylist for the senior style director of Elle Magazine, Kate Lanphear.
Upon returning to Ireland in 2011, O'Neill began writing her first novel Only Ever Yours, which was published in 2014 by Quercus. She has since won the Sunday Independent Newcomer of the Year at the 2014 Bord Gáis Energy Irish Book Awards; the Children’s Books Ireland Eilís Dillon Award for a First Children’s Book; and The Bookseller‘s inaugural YA Book Prize 2015. The runaway success of her debut, originally published as a novel for Young Adults, meant Quercus issued an adult edition in 2015.
Her second book, Asking For It, was a Number 1 Bestseller in Ireland. It was named Irish Times Book of the Month in September 2015. It was also awarded the Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards 2015 and the honour prize for fiction at the CBI awards 2016. The American Library Association awarded it a Michael L. Printz Honor for excellence in literature written for young adults, and the New York Times called it "riveting and essential" Asking For It was one of the top ten best-selling books in Ireland in 2016.
Rights of both books have been sold: Killer Content acquired the film and TV rights for Only Ever Yours, and Bandit Television owns TV rights for Asking For It.
O'Neill is currently working as a freelance journalist for a variety of Irish national newspapers and magazines, covering feminist issues, fashion and pop culture. As of 2016, she has written as a weekly columnist for the Irish Examiner. She was a contributor to I Call Myself A Feminist, a collection of essays from women under 30 explaining why they see themselves as feminists that was published by Virago earlier this year. She won the Literature Award at the Irish Tatler Women of the Year Awards 2015, Best Author at the Stellar Shine Awards 2015 and the . She was also awarded the Praeses Elite award by Trinity College Dublin.
She hosted the RTE2 documentary, Asking For It?: Reality Bites, based on her second book, which aired on 1 November 2016. In this documentary Louise explores the issue of consent and tackling sexual assault and rape culture in Ireland.