Life Cycle of a Moth: Launching Rowe Irvin

An itchy feeling.

A wrinkle in the forest.

A cracking twig.

A coming sound.

Myma, do you hear it?

Myma, do you hear?

Myma?

Maya and Daughter live in complete isolation in a secluded woodland, their days aligned with the light and changing seasons, a complex pattern of routine and ritual. Daughter has never questioned the life her mother has chosen for them; the life that has meant she's never met another soul, or known anywhere except their forest home.

But one day, when Daughter is almost sixteen, a red-haired stranger steps into the confines of their territory. Where there was always two, suddenly there are three - and the carefully constructed world that Maya has built to keep her daughter safe may not survive it.

Urgent, haunting and thrillingly alive, Life Cycle of a Moth explores both the tenderness and ferocity of maternal love, asking what we might find ourselves capable of - and willing to sacrifice - in order to shelter those we hold dear.

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ABOUT OUR SPEAKERS:

Rowe Irvin is a writer and artist living between London and Manchester. Her work has appeared in Prototype 5, Unquiet Slumbers: A Collection of Folk Horror Tales (Nēpenthé Press) and The Stinging Fly. She was awarded second prize in the 2024 Seán Ó Faoláin International Short Story Competition, and has been shortlisted for the Bridport Poetry Prize and the Bath Short Story Award.

Her collaborative publication, Quiver, made with the artist Georg Wilson, was published in 2023 with Berntson Bhattacharjee Gallery. She is currently completing a PhD in Creative Writing, with a focus on oral tradition and folk tales, at the University of Manchester. Life Cycle of a Moth is her first novel.

Cailean Steed is a writer based near Glasgow, Scotland. Their first novel, Home, was published by Raven Bloomsbury in the UK, North America, Australia and New Zealand. The Telegraph named Cailean one of their ‘Four Best Debut Novelists’ of 2023, and Home received excellent reviews in The Irish Independent, Scotland on Sunday and Good Reading Magazine. Their second novel, The Mirror Halls, will be published in 2026 by John Murrays in the UK and Little, Brown in the US. They are represented by Oli Munson at A.M Heath.