Neil Jordan was born in 1950 in Sligo. His first book of stories, Night in Tunisia, won the Guardian Fiction Prize in 1979, and his subsequent critically acclaimed novels include The Past, Sunrise with Sea Monster, Shade and, most recently, The Drowned Detective. The films he has written and directed have won multiple awards, including an Academy Award (The Crying Game), a Golden Bear at Venice (Michael Collins), a Silver Bear at Berlin (The Butcher Boy) and several BAFTAS (Mona Lisa and The End of the Affair). He lives in Dublin.

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It looked like any other carnival, but of course it wasn't.

It had its own little backstreets, its alleyways of hanging bulbs and ghost trains and Punch and Judy stands .

And at the end of one he saw the Hall of Mirrors. There were looping strings of carnival lights leading towards it, and a large sign in mirrored glass reading 'Burleigh's Amazing Hall of Mirrors' and the sign reflected the lights in all sorts of magically distorted ways.

To Andy and his parents, it looks like any other carnival: creaking ghost train, rusty rollercoaster and circus performers. But of course it isn't.

Drawn to the hall of mirrors, Andy enters and is hypnotised by the many selves staring back at him. Sometime later, one of those selves walks out rejoins his parents - leaving Andy trapped inside the glass, snatched from the tensions of his suburban home and transported to a world where the laws of gravity are meaningless and time performs acrobatic tricks.

And now an identical stranger inhabits Andy's life, unsettling his mother with a curious blankness, as mysterious events start unfolding in their Irish coastal town.

Written in beautifully poetic prose

Has an aching, plaintive melancholy

His cinematic sensibility yields prose of the most bewitching kind

One of Ireland's most talented artists

Jordan has a light touch and a clear eye on matters of the heart

His dialogue and characterisation shine

His belief in language is absolute, as is his mastery of it

You can never know where you are going with Neil Jordan . Extraordinary

The cinematic potential for that longed-for movie is striking