Catríona O'Reilly was born Dublin in 1973, grew up in Wicklow and Dublin, and now lives in Lincoln. She studied archaeology and English at Trinity College Dublin, where she wrote a doctoral thesis on American literature; she has also held the Harper-Wood Studentship from St John's College, Cambridge. Her first collection The Nowhere Birds was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection in 2001, and won the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature in 2002 (given to the best new book by any Irish writer). Her second collection, The Sea Cabinet (Bloodaxe Books, 2006), was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and was shortlisted for the Irish Times Poetry Now Award in 2007. She is a freelance writer and critic, has written for BBC Radio 4, translated from the Galician of María do Cebreiro, and published some fiction. She has collaborated with artist Isabel Nolan, was a contributing editor of the Irish poetry journal Metre, and has been editor of recent issues of Poetry Ireland Review.