Mark Kelleher with Associate Director of Creative Writing, Mary Morrissy. Photograph: Denis Scannell

Forget Eastenders and Corrie! Turn to the Evening Echo instead where Mark Kelleher’s “Scattered” is into its second week in the newspaper’s summer soap slot.  Mark, who’s completing his MA Creative Writing dissertation at the moment, was commissioned to write the 12-episode soap on the strength of a three-episode pilot he submitted as part of a new – and hopefully continuing – association between the Writing for Media module (EN 6057) and Examiner publications.

Eight students pitched soap ideas as part of their final portfolio for the module.  Features editor of the Echo, John Dolan, and his deputy, Elaine Duggan, made the final decision on which soap idea they would commission on the strength of these submissions.

After much deliberation, John said they went for Mark’s entry, whose hero is a Cork street cleaner.

“We loved the strong Cork city setting for the story, and the excellent descriptive style throughout. The story gripped us from the start with its fine blend of dark topics and light moods and after introducing us to Timmy Riordan, the plot swiftly took us on unexpected turns. The subject matter of male suicide is very topical and very serious and if the story can touch local people who have had, or will have, an experience of this, directly or indirectly, it may well do some good.”

In an interview in the Echo to coincide with the start of the soap on August 8, Mark described the process of writing: “I thought it would be interesting to write from the perspective of a street sweeper who probably encounters a lot of situations. . . through this work.”

“The protagonist is Timmy Riordan, a failed writer. He took up work as a street sweeper as research for his novel. But ten years have passed and he’s still sweeping the streets and hasn’t written anything. In the story, Timmy encounters young men (including his brother) in a lorry who are meeting up in secret to talk about how depressed they are and what is causing it. This inspires Timmy to go off and actually start writing.”

You can catch up with Mark’s soap on the Echo website – http://www.eveningecho.ie/.  It runs until Saturday.