Meet team Frazzled Lit
Hello. Here are your Editors -yes, you see that right, we have no chief!
Here all editors are created equal. After all, we’re all frazzled here … it helps!
We also have an excellent reading team on board!
So without further ado, introductions. Who exactly is manning this firecracker?
Jennifer McMahon - Editor in Chief
Jennifer McMahon is an Irish author, and is represented by Brian Langan at Storyline Literary Agency. She was the overall winner of the 2024 All-Ireland Scholarships Creative Writing Award (Public), a winner of the Irish Writers Centre Novel Fair, has been shortlisted for the Irish Book Awards Short Story of the Year (2023), the Bridport Short Story Prize and many other notable awards, and was nominated for Best Of The Net 2024. She was a second-place winner of the Oxford Prize (winter 2023), and her work appears in Crannog, HOWL, Irish Independent (New Irish Writing), Oxford Prize Anthology (2022 and 2023), Fractured Lit, Heimat Review (issues 2 and 6), Empyrean, Books Ireland Magazine, Loft Books (issues IV and V), the Retreat West 'Swan Song' Anthology, and in many other places.
Jennifer loves to read stories and novels by Nuala O'Connor, Donal Ryan, David Butler, Kevin Barry, and enjoys tales from Granta and The New Yorker.
For inspiration from past writers, she looks to Chekhov, William Faulkner and James Salter. Jennifer is a big fan of Graham Greene, and has read most of what he wrote. She is also partial to the works of Kingsley Amis and Willa Cather.
Jennifer is so busy writing, she doesn't have much time for television, but is partial to US cop shows like NYPD Blue and Chicago PD, superhero movies from the Marvel Comics Universe (because the writing and plots are so admirably tight), the works of Christopher Nolan and Dennis Vielleneuve, and the acting and direction of Kenneth Branagh. And if a film stars Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Joel Edgerton or Leonardo DiCaprio, she's totally down with it!
Find Jennifer on Twitter at @AuthorJmcm and on the web at LinkTree.
Laura Cooney - Editor in Chief
Laura Cooney is from Edinburgh with an M.A in English Language and Literature from Glasgow University. Her first poetry chapbook Motherbunnet, published by Backroom Poetry in 2023, sold out of its limited print run and her next, entitled, No Trauma/No Drama (also with Backroom Poetry) is due for release in August 2024.
Laura’s work has been published most recently in Northern Gravy (issue 11) Loft (issue V) Punk Noir (‘Betrayal’ issue) The Voidspace Zine (various pop-ups) Roi Faineant Press (Cubiclemate 68) The Winged Moon (‘Ancient’ issue) and in many more places.
Laura is proud of her, as yet unbroken, 26 month acceptance streak and has certainly earned her motto, “She had no time, but did it anyway,” by also writing for children. Though, that is, as they say … another story.
She is seeking representation.
Laura loves to read stories and novels by Maggie O’Farrell, Claire Keegan, Margaret Atwood and Jenni Fagin and Graeme Macrae Burnet or for inspiration from past writers, she looks to Agatha Christie, Ray Bradbury, Ian (Iain) Banks and Dickens. Laura is a fan of a wide range of poetry from Edwin Morgan, Norman MacCaig, William Carlos Williams and T.S Elliot to contemporary poets such as Brian Bilston, Imogen Stirling, Hollie McNish, Amanda Huggins and Sue Finch. In children’s writing she could write a whole other bio.
In terms of televison and film Laura prefers detective, law enforcement, mystery and medical shows as well as fantasy, sci fi and cheesy 90s action films. She has a penchant for cult classics; such as The Breakfast, Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Clerks. Laura has wide tastes when it comes to theatre and the arts and she spends a lot of time watching Tennessee Williams or Harold Pinter plays AND remakes. Laura also loves vaudeville and musical theatre, if any of this helps you at all. While we're here, her favourite colour is Purple!
Find Laura on Twitter and Instagram: @lozzawriting and www.lozzawriting.com
Mike Murray - Peer reader
Mike Murray is a working class London/Irish born writer, producing novels, short stories, creative non-fiction and occasionally poetry.
He was a winner of the 2022 Irish Writer's Centre Novel Fair, was Highly Commended in the same competition in 2024, and was a finalist of the Jericho Writers First 500 in 2024. He also won the Book Edit Writers' Prize 2024 and was shortlisted for the Fish Memoir 2024. His work has been published in Frazzled Lit, the Parracombe Prize, The Gaia Papers, Quay Voices, Cabinet of Heed, Here Comes Everyone, Honest Ulsterman, Envoi and other lit mags.
He lives, writes, walks and runs in North Devon.
Kerry Byrne - Peer reader
Kerry Byrne lives and writes in the Fens, with a backdrop of sky-filled water and endless horizon. Her work has appeared in Ellipsis Zine, FlashFlood, Frazzled Lit, Lucy Writers, Pidgeonholes, Roi Fainéant Press and streetcake magazine, among other fine places, with her fiction nominated for Best of the Net. Kerry holds a master’s in creative writing with distinction from Glasgow University.
Seán McNicholl - Peer reader
Seán McNicholl is an Irish GP who enjoys writing short stories in a variety of genres. He is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, and has been nominated for Best of the Net (BOTN) 2024, and Best Microfiction 2025. He has been published in Beyond Words, Raw Lit, Frazzled Lit, Belfast Review and Intrepidus Ink, among others.
For more: www.seanmcnicholl.com