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Emma Donoghue 2021

© Una Roulston 2021 (hi-res download)

Born in Dublin in 1969, I am an award-winning novelist, screenwriter, and playright, living in Canada with my family.

My novel Room (2010) was shortlisted for the Man Booker and Orange Prizes and has sold almost three million copies. I adapted it into my first feature film, Room, directed by Lenny Abrahamson, which was nominated for four Academy Awards for Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Director, Best Picture, and Best Actress (won by our lead, Brie Larson). My theatrical adaptation of Room with songs by Cora Bissett and Kathryn Joseph had productions in England, Scotland and Ireland in 2017 and Canada in 2022, and is set to run on Broadway starring Tony-winner Adrienne Warren from April to September 2023.

The Wonder (2016, a finalist for Canada's Giller Prize and the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year), is about a 'fasting girl' in nineteenth-century Ireland and the English nurse sent to watch her. I adapted it into the 2022 film with director Sebastián Lelio and Alice Birch, starring Florence Pugh, produced by Element Pictures (who made Room) and House Productions for Netflix.

My latest novel Haven(2022) is an adventure story about the first three people to set foot on the island now known as Skellig Michael, around the year 600: a scholar-priest called Artt who has a dream telling him to leave the sinful world behind and find an isolated spot to found a monastery, and young Trian and old Cormac who agree to follow him into the unknown.

Set in Dublin during the Great Flu pandemic in 1918 (and written before COVID-19), The Pull of the Stars (2020) is about a nurse midwife, a doctor and a volunteer helper living through three days in a maternity quarantine ward.

My other books are the historical novels Frog Music, The Sealed Letter, Life Mask, Slammerkin, and contemporary ones Akin, Landing, Hood and Stir-fry; two family stories for younger readers illustrated by Caroline Hadilaksono, The Lotterys Plus One and The Lotterys More Or Less; and short-story collections Astray, Three and a Half Deaths (UK ebook), Touchy Subjects, The Woman Who Gave Birth to Rabbits, and Kissing the Witch.

I have also published literary history including Inseparable, We Are Michael Field, and Passions Between Women, as well as two anthologies that span the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries.

Readers, hearing from you at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. makes my day, and I’ll respond as soon as I can find a moment. I’m happy to help with any obscure query to which you can’t find an answer on this website, or in the many articles by or interviews with me online... but please don't ask me to provide basic information easily available elsewhere. I’m afraid I can't visit book clubs in person or by Zoom, or comment on anyone's work; I'm always writing.

For queries about my fiction, non-fiction, drama for stage or radio, or about translations, please contact my primary agent Caroline Davidson of the Caroline Davidson Literary Agency in London (U.K.), 44 20 8995 5768,  This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

For queries related to film or tv, please contact my screen agent Kassie Evashevski at Anonymous Content (New York), This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

For any US licensing or speaking engagement queries, please contact my American literary agent Kathleen Anderson of Anderson Literary Management (New York), 212 645 6045, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

To request an interview, or invite me to give a talk/reading, please contact my publishers in your territory:


This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. (US)

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.(Canada)

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. (Ireland)

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Latest News

Due out late August 2023, my fifteenth novel Learned by Heart tells the long buried love story of Eliza Raine (an orphan heiress banished from India)  and Anne Lister (nowadays nicknamed Gentleman Jack), who met at 14 at boarding school in York. The novel draws on many years of investigation and hundreds of their unpublished letters as well as Lister's five-million-word secret journal.

After productions in England, Scotland, Ireland and Canada, Room is coming to Broadway from April to September 2023, starring Tony-winner Adrienne Warren. I adapted my novel for the stage, with songs by Cora Bissett and Kathryn Joseph.

The Wonder (on Netflix), starring Florence Pugh, is based on my 2016 novel of the same name. The screenplay is by me, director Sebastián Lelio, and Alice Birch and the film has been nominated for numerous awards including the Bafta for Outstanding British Film.

My latest novel Haven is a bestseller in Ireland and Canada. In this adventure story set around the year 600, three men vow to leave the world behind and set out in a small boat to found a monastery on an island their leader has seen in a dream, with only faith to guide them; where they land is the extraordinary island now known as Skellig Michael.