The McKernan Literary Agency & Consultancy Edinburgh
Michael Collins
Midnight in a Perfect Life Karl is a writer, ‘standing on the precipice of 40’, with his wife Lori, who fears going over the edge without a baby in her arms. As they embark upon IVF treatment, Karl’s insecurity, rooted in his troubled childhood and exacerbated by the perilous nature of a writing life, begin to emerge. Karl’s only real success as a writer has been as a ghost to the famous crime writer Perry Fennimore – and even then he had managed to lose both the job, and his agent, and to get a lawsuit slapped upon himself in the process. But, in the midst of a financial and existential crisis, brought to a head by the incapacitating expense of fertility treatment, Perry Fennimore re-enters Karl’s life. This time Fennimore wants more from Karl than fiction. Creative genius is the result, but at a cost. Can a man detach himself from the world he inhabits without losing himself along the way?
Current film adapations of his novels include The Resurrectionists to be directed by John Madden. Lost Souls is currently being adapted by A Film Monkey Production.
His titles include The Meat Eaters, (Cape 1992), The Life and Times of a Teaboy, (Orion 1993), The Feminists Go Swimming, (Orion 1994), Emerald Underground, (Orion 1998), The Keepers of Truth, (Orion 2000), The Resurrectionists, (Orion 2003), Lost Souls, (Orion 2004), The Secret Life of E. Robert Pendleton, (Orion 2006).
Michael Collins was born in 1964 in Limerick, Ireland. His first book of stories, The Meateaters, burst into print in 1992 (its effect compared by The Times to 'being mugged in a savage land'. Since then he has won or been shortlisted for several major prizes incuding the Booker Prize and the Impac Prize. His novels have been translated into twenty languages. He lives near Seattle in the US, although he keeps very close ties with Ireland and travels very widely. Michael is also an extreme athlete, having travelled to the US orginally on an athletics scholarship in 1983. In some ways he has been running ever since.
Michael Collins was born in 1964 in Limerick, Ireland. His first book of stories, The Meateaters, burst into print in 1992 (its effect compared by The Times to 'being mugged in a savage land'. Since then he has won or been shortlisted for several major prizes incuding the Booker Prize and the Impac Prize. His novels have been translated into twenty languages. He lives near Seattle in the US, although he keeps very close ties with Ireland and travels very widely. Michael is also an extreme athlete, having travelled to the US orginally on an athletics scholarship in 1983. In some ways he has been running ever since. 