About

Sue Rainsford is an irish fiction and arts writer based in Dublin.

She is a graduate of Trinity College, IADT, and Bennington College, Vermont. Her debut novel, Follow Me To Ground, was originally published by New Island Books in Ireland (2018), in the UK by Doubleday (2019), by Scribner in the US (2021) and in France by Aux Forges de Vulcain in 2022. Her second novel, Redder Days, was published by Doubleday in Ireland and the UK (2021) and by Forges in France in 2024. Her third novel, From Out My Heart, is forthcoming with Lilliput Press (2026) and Aux Forges de Vulcain (2027). 

Her stories and novels have been nominated for the Republic of Consciousness Award, the Desmond Elliott Prize, the Prix Jean Monnet des Jeunes Européens, the New York Radio Festival Awards, the Desperate Literature Prize for Short Fiction, and have received starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews and Publishers Weekly. 

Sue is also the grateful recipient of the VAI/DCC Art Writing Award, the Arts Council Literature Bursary Award, a MacDowell Fellowship, the Kate O’Brien Award and le Prix Imaginales Award, and she has been awarded residencies by such institutions as the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Maynooth University and University College Dublin. Notable commissions include BBC Radio 4 and RTÉ Radio 1; her short story, "Shorn", was read by Saoirse Ronan. 

Sue is represented by Sallyanne Sweeney at International Creative Agency.

Subscribe to her Substack, A Penny Spinning, here.