William Trevor was born in Mitchelstown, County Cork, in 1928 and spent his childhood in provincial Ireland. He studied at Trinity College, Dublin. He has written many novels, and won many prizes including the Whitbread Book of the Year Award. The Hill Bachelors (2000), a collection of short stories, won both the PEN/Macmillan Silver Pen Award for Short Stories and the Irish Times Irish Literature Prize for Fiction in 2001. The Story of Lucy Gault (2002), was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction. William Trevor's latest books are: A Bit On the Side (2004), on the theme of adultery; The Dressmaker's Child (2005); and Cheating at Canasta (2007). Many of William Trevor's stories have appeared in The New Yorker and other magazines. He has also written plays for the stage, and for radio and television. In 2002 William Trevor was awarded an honorary knighthood in recognition of his services to literature.