Category: Success stories (page 2 of 10)

Interview with City short course alumna and debut novelist Tania Tay

June 20, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Tania Tay is the debut author of The Other Woman, published in May 2024 with Headline Accent.

Tania first wrote stories and plays on her mum’s old typewriter in the school holidays. She worked as an advertising copywriter in agencies from Singapore to London – which was great training in writing commercial fiction. One day at a job interview, she was asked if she was a “brave writer”. It triggered her join a short story class at the City Lit, with Leone Ross where she wrote a few weird, dark tales. Her writing explores female friendship, and the relationship between mothers and daughters. Occasionally there’s a supernatural twist. Tania is the author of the Spellcasters middle grade series, in collaboration with Storymix Studio. She has written a screenplay, developed with BBC Writersroom London Voices. Tania is second generation British Malaysian Chinese. She studied History of Art at the University of Edinburgh and lives with her family in East London.

  1. What inspired you to write your novel and how did the idea for the story come about?

 

The idea came from a writing exercise where I had to imagine if I lost everything in my life. At the time, my children were younger and I was a stay-at-home mum. I imagined what would have to happen for me to lose my husband and children.

 

  1. Why did you choose to write in the thriller genre? What is it about this genre that interests you most?

 

I’ve always enjoyed reading psychological thrillers where the suspense is more in the mind than in spilling blood and guts. The threat of danger to ordinary people going about their everyday lives is terrifying, as what if…. these things happened to me?

 

  1. When did you first think you wanted to be a writer?

 

I’m first and foremost a reader. I’ve always been a book worm and started writing plays as a child, inspired by fairy tales and stories I loved. I worked as a copywriter in advertising, but I never thought I could be a proper writer of fiction until I did a short story writing class at the City Lit.

 

  1. You took our Crime Writing short course at City, how helpful was it in the development of your debut thriller?

 

The course was invaluable. At the time I’d mainly been writing for children. Caroline Green was so inspiring with her personal journey about how she’d made the change from writing YA to writing adult crime. She introduced us to some brilliant crime fiction excerpts, many of which I’d never read. She set short writing exercises, and we teamed up with people in the class to discuss ideas. The course really got my imagination going. Soon after taking the course, I started writing the novel that’s now my debut.

 

  1. How important do you think feedback from writing groups and creative writing courses is?

 

Trusted feedback has been really important for me. I’ve been a member of various critique groups over the years. But I’m very careful about who I choose to trust to give me feedback. I only work with creative writing tutors and peers who enjoy reading and writing similar genres to my own. I don’t see my work as literary, but commercial so I surround myself by other writers who enjoy reading and writing commercial fiction. Before I signed up for Caroline Green’s course, I’d read her books and knew that I enjoyed her work and that she would be a great teacher for me.

 

  1. What were some of the biggest challenges you faced while writing your novel?

 

To keep going, even when I got stuck. I knew I needed some big twists but I didn’t know what they could be. I had to draft and redraft until I found them.

 

  1. What has the route to publication been like for you?

 

It’s taken me a LONG time… years! I had short stories published in 2002 but could never finish a whole novel. I kept trying different genres including children’s and YA. I queried my first YA novel in 2018 and had some nice rejections. My debut adult suspense novel was started in 2018. I worked on it for over a year with the help of a tutor. Then I re-drafted it again. In April 2022 I was shortlisted for an open submissions competition with Headline and had to finish another draft by August. In September, I won a publishing contract, and it was finally published May 2024.

 

  1. Which writers inspired you as a younger author, and who inspires you now?

 

I’ve always loved mysteries – As a child and teenager, I read Agatha Christie, Daphne Du Maurier, Georgette Heyer. I’ve always enjoyed psychological thrillers, like Zoe Heller’s Notes on a Scandal, Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl, Damage by Josephine Hart, Ian McEwan and Margaret Atwood. Currently, my favourite authors are Lisa Jewell, Louise Candlish, Lucy Foley, Ellery Lloyd, Sabine Durrant, Lucie Whitehouse, Araminta Hall, Lauren North, BP Walter.

 

  1. What advice would you give to other aspiring writers who are thinking about publishing a novel?

 

Read a lot in the genre you enjoy, and analyse your favourites. Take a short course or do some writing workshops to inspire you. Surround yourself with writers and get involved in the writing community, whether on social media – Instagram and twitter – or by going to festivals. Be nice to people and tell other authors when you enjoy their work. Write them nice reviews! It’s a long and can be lonely path to publication, so you need to find your writing tribe to share the ups and downs with. When you’re finally agented and have a publishing deal, these will be the people who will happily give you endorsements, reviews and shout about your books to everyone.

 

  1. What are you working on now?

 

A destination thriller set on a luxury resort on a Malaysian island. A group of colleagues from an advertising agency re-unite for a party, but there are secrets from the past casting a toxic shade over the festivities. And then a dead body is found.

Thank you so much, Tania! We wish you every success with your debut novel and all the many novels to come. We can’t wait to read the book!

To order Tania’s novel, visit HERE.

For more information about Tania and her writing, visit HERE.

To sign up to an intensive week-long summer school version of the course Tania took at City, visit HERE.

For all information on our writing short courses, visit HERE. Or for all our other short courses, please visit HERE.

Interview with Lara Haworth, author of debut novel Monumenta

June 14, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Author and artist, Lara Haworth

Lara Haworth is a writer, visual artist and filmmaker. In 2018 she was accepted onto City’s flagship year-long novel writing programme, The Novel Studio. She was also the winner that year of our Literary Agent Competition. Always tipped for success, last year Lara sold her debut novel, Monumenta, to Canongate. The novel will be published this summer. We caught up with Lara to find out more about her writing life and her journey to publication.

 

  1. Have you always written?

Yes. As soon as I was able. I wrote my first story aged four in a small notebook on my mother’s desk. Its protagonist was a knight who comes across three forking paths, and cannot decide which one to take. Goodness gracious, I wanted to him to say, as he realises the choice lying ahead. I spelt it goodness gracars.

2. Which book was the first to have a real impact on you as a reader, and which as a writer?

The first book I read that made me realise there was something other than just a story going on was The Great Gatsby. I was eleven. Much of it went over my head, the unrequited love, the critique of wealth, the disillusion. But I remember Fitzgerald describing the ‘silver pepper of the stars’ and looking up at the sky and actually gasping. So that’s what you can do, I realised. And maybe this, too, and this…

Fast forward twenty-three years, and my life is in some disarray. (This is an understatement.) I was visiting friends in Spain and started reading Deborah Levy’s Things I Don’t Want to Know. About three chapters in I felt an overwhelming pressure, as if a dam was breaking somewhere in my heart, or my throat, or my knees. I started to pace up and down and up and down this beach, gripping the book like it was a hand, pulling me up from a deep well. It gave me a kind of ferocious, blistering instruction to write, properly, seriously, now. It said, There is nothing else for you. When I got back from Spain, I applied to the Novel Studio. I still have the book. It has these white-knuckled dents in the cover.

3. If you could tell your younger writing self anything, what would it be?

Don’t expect anyone to find you, and your writing, without telling them where you are or what you’re doing. Don’t imagine that this is something you can do on your own. Don’t be frightened. (You will also be frightened.)

4. Why do you write and what makes it so vital for you?

When I’m in the excavating, mining stage, it rolls on a scale between because I have to and because I want to. Sometimes, when the I want to is struggling, because I am tired, or frightened, or stuck, or distracted, the I have to engages more fiercely, as more of a grim-faced imperative, shaking its head and pulling me back to my desk, to my thoughts, my subconscious, until the I want to returns in equal measure, to provide a lift. At its best, they both work together, and that is when you’re flying.

When I’m redrafting and editing, things get bigger, wider. I picture the reader: their joy, their woe, their precious time. If I can illuminate something – a feeling, a place, the way a potato slices open in a ‘90s deli – that impresses on a reader a sense of recognition, and a slightly different way of seeing and thinking about the world, then that is also why I write. There’s politics there too. I write to smuggle in difficult histories, strange emotional realities, and I try to centre queer lives, so long obscured in the literary canon.

5. Do you think writing can be taught? And relatedly, can you tell us a bit about your experience of being on writing courses?

When I was a teenager, I was at a friend’s house, whose father worked in publishing. Over dinner, he went on an extended rant about how you couldn’t teach creative writing, how all his authors had always written, and that was the only thing that could possibly matter. Perhaps because I didn’t know anyone else that worked in publishing and I wanted to be a writer, I really took his words to heart. It was a bad decision. From that moment on I avoided creative writing classes, and chose instead to write alone, in secret, thinking: I’m writing, and this is what I’ve always done! Someone will find me and recognise my labour. They didn’t. And the longer I wrote in secret, the more my fear grew about sharing my work. Every now and then I would submit something to a ridiculously prestigious magazine or journal and then be crushed when I was (inevitably) rejected. A pretty sad cycle, that I thankfully managed, eventually, to break. I wish I had done it sooner.

While I do think that there needs to be some ineffable something to your writing to get the best out of a writing course, there are a whole host of things you simply cannot get on your own. Like, learning how to build a novel, which is architecture. Learning how to edit, how to build pace, when to cut, when to trust your reader, when to give them more. This you learn by submitting your work to be read by your peers. And you’re not ready. But then you become ready. And the readiness grows. And that expectation, that deadline, is generative. It makes you a better writer.

My time on the Novel Studio was completely transformative in this respect. Being read. It was such a relief. Even if the feedback was hard, I would still sometimes feel very emotional on the tube home, seeing all those different handwritings in the margins of my manuscripts. And it was a privilege to read my peers’ writing too – to lose myself in their worlds, and bring my sensibilities as a writer to their work. The course also taught me that books don’t live in a blank space. They’re deeply connected to the world, most pressingly, the publishing world. All of the things that I had so studiously avoided for so long: talking about my work, emailing agents, trying my luck, writing pitches – all had to be done. And it was so very helpful to be given the tools to do this, to knock on all those guarded doors.

6. Can you tell us a bit about your experience of getting a publishing deal? Has anything been surprising, in a good or bad way?!

During the Novel Studio, one of my tutors revealed that her first novel did not get picked up for publication. I remember so vividly the shock I felt, as if she’d reported her own death. I glimpsed how painful that must have been for her. Perhaps because it had been such hard work to even get to that point, it was something I hadn’t considered –– even though the evidence, should I need it, was all around me, told again and again by many of my favourite writers (Hilary Mantel!).

A year and a half later, I was telling the same story. I wasn’t so naive that I thought I would definitely get a publishing deal for my first novel, but it did seem like finishing the final draft and working through more rounds of rolling rejections to get an agent might mean I was finally there. I was, of course, wrong. My first novel was not picked up. It was an extremely painful experience. Loss. A kind of grief. By that point I had gone from extreme secrecy about my writing to extreme exposure – and, in the way of all worst nightmares, my failure was also happening on a very public scale. Everyone knew.

Full credit to my partner, who after watching me mooch around in my depression for a while, said, The only thing that’s going to help now is getting back to work. She was right. I had started writing Monumenta in the summer of 2020. I went back to it in autumn 2021, and within two months it was finished. The rejection had actually sharpened my writing, made me care less about failure. I was able to take more risks. I carved a chunk out of it and submitted it as a short story to the Bridport Prize, and actually won. Very unexpected. This was the catalyst for my agent to submit it to publishers.

I’m still surprised Monumenta got picked up. It doesn’t really conform to any of the silent rules of the industry. It’s short. It’s about monuments, and difficult European history. I couldn’t think of any other books to compare it to. In the end, we had two offers and went with Canongate, who have always been my dream publisher. Securing the deal took two extremely nerve-wracking weeks. Sometimes I still can’t believe it’s real. I think what I’m trying to say with this very long-winded answer is that risk and failure are not just part of the process, they are the process, they influence and change the work in rich and strange ways.

7. Which fiction writers inspire you currently?

Mariana Enriquez. Wendy Erskine. Olga Tokarczuk. Jenny Erpenbeck. Colson Whitehead. Deborah Levy. Kevin Barry. Christina Sharpe. Lan Samantha Chang. Anne Enright. Sebastian Barry.

8. Do you have a particular writing process? Favourite place or time of day to write? Any rituals?

I work best when I have dedicated chunks of time. I’m not, sadly, one of those writers that can write for fifteen minutes in the morning and then get on with their day. It’s a whole day / night thing. It’s all or nothing. I have chosen a more unsettling, unstable line of freelance money earning, so that I can work manically for periods and save up, and take time off to write. This functions in some senses, but during dark nights of the soul it can feel fundamentally unsensible and wrong. When I am writing, I have a target word count every day, and that can take anywhere between two hours and a whole day to achieve. I’m lucky to have my own little writing space in our house, which overlooks the street. So I still see a little bit of life, going by.

9. Are you someone who plans and plots before you write or do you write to discover the story? Or both?!

I start with at least one person (who’s already been talking to me in my head for a while), a place, a primary situation, and a sense of its undertows. But I write to discover. I feel quite strongly that that’s my job – to go to that weird place of half dream and subconscious. A dark, dark forest. It’s a constant tussle between being in control of my material and also letting my material have some control. To let it go. I think that plotting it all out at the start would essentially mean executing a plan, and that’s not really the point, for me. It’s not a report. It’s got to be deeper than that. About a third of the way through I start to see what’s happening, where the loops and patterns and connections are, what the characters are wanting to do, and not do, say, and not say.

10. And to finish, what are you working on now?

Lara’s debut novel, Monumenta

I’m halfway through my third novel, which is called Julie Needs Things. All my novels are different, but this one feels harder than the others. It takes place over a long period of time, it’s told in the first person, it’s set in the UK, it contains some autobiographical elements. Yet it is a work of fiction. I wrestle with telling stories from my own life. I feel, instinctively, that it might not be interesting.

Thank you so much, Lara! To pre-order Lara’s novel, visit HERE. And for more about Lara and her work, visit HERE.

For anyone inspired to join The Novel Studio, applications are now open with a 30 June deadline. Please email any questions to Emily.Pedder.1@city.ac.uk

For all our other short writing courses, please visit HERE.

The Art of Curating and Exhibition Management

May 21, 2024 / / 0 Comments

What’s Your Vision?

At City short courses, our Curating and Exhibition Management course is run by Renée Pfister, an esteemed art consultant, curator, registrar and business development manager. She was part of the curatorial team at the British Museum, where she was involved in realising major projects such as the Great Court and the Weston Gallery of Roman-Britain. At the Tate Gallery she worked as a Registrar from 1999 to 2005 and was responsible for managing acquisitions and ground-breaking international exhibitions from the Tate’s collection. She also participated in a Registrars’ exchange programme at the Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) in New York, wrote a chapter for the Routledge publication Understanding International Art Markets & Management, and worked for the late Sir Anthony Caro as an advisor. Since 2010 she has run her own art and gallery consultancy.

Renée Pfister Art & Gallery Consultancy quickly established a loyal portfolio of clients: Whitney Museum of American Art; Morgan Library & Museum, both in New York; the British Embassy, Paris; the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, the Government Art Collection, the German Embassy and Waltham Forest Council, London; the Victoria Museum, Kiev and the Pushkin Museum State Museum of Fine Art, Moscow, providing them with a wide range of collection and exhibition management services. The Consultancy also represents many international artists: Peter Zimmermann, Chris Tille, Alexandra Carr and Elisa Bracher to name but a few. More recently Renée worked with the Serpentine Gallery London,  Torus Torus Studios Tyne & Wear; Detroit Institute of Art, Detroit; National Library Canberra; Islamic Arts Biennale Jeddah and the Manar Light Project Abu Dhabi. Renée  also offers support to gallery owners new in the business and career mentoring services to emerging and mid-career artists.

Renée Pfister condition checking a painting in a private residence in Paris ©Renée Pfister.

As Renee explores in her City course, curating and exhibition management go beyond mere display to how stories are told and emotions provoked, and has the power to foster connections between audiences and artworks. In this blog, we delve into the essence of this process, exploring what it involves and how it shapes our cultural landscape.

Curating and Exhibition Management

Curating entails selecting, organising, and presenting artworks or artifacts within a defined indoor or outdoor space, within a thematic or conceptual framework. Exhibition management encompasses the legal, conservation, logistic and technical requirements of bringing these curatorial  visions to life, from planning and budgeting to installation and promotion. Together, they form one of the core activities of museums, galleries, and cultural institutions worldwide, shaping the way we engage with art, heritage, and our world.

The Value of Curating

  1. Interpretation: Curators interpret the significance of artworks and contextualise them within broader historical, cultural, political or social narratives. Through thoughtful selection and arrangement, they guide viewers on a journey of discovery, fostering deeper understanding and appreciation.
  2. Meaning: Exhibitions are designed to evoke emotions, provoke thought, and spark dialogue. Effective curation transforms spaces into dynamic environments where artworks come alive, forging connections between creators, audiences, and ideas.
  3. Cultural Heritage: Curation plays a pivotal role in preserving and promoting cultural heritage, safeguarding artworks for future generations. By curating exhibitions that celebrate diversity and inclusivity, they contribute to a more vibrant and inclusive cultural landscape.
  4. Innovation and Dialogue: By curating exhibitions that embrace experimentation and a diversity of perspectives, curators foster innovation and stimulate dialogue, driving cultural change.

Renée Pfister in conversation with Peter Zimmermann, discussing his exhibition ‘Colourscape’ at the German Embassy in London ©Peter Zimmermann, Thorsten Schneider and Renée Pfister.

The Curatorial and Exhibition Management Process

  1. Research and Concepts: Curators begin by conducting extensive research on artists, movements, and themes, identifying overarching concepts or narratives that will guide the exhibition.

    Beyond Display

  2. Selection, Collections and Loans: Curators select artworks from the museum’s collections and borrow additional key representations that align with the agreed concept, considering factors such as artistic quality, historical significance, and relevance to the theme.
  3. Design and Installation: Curators work closely with designers, conservators, registrars, and art handling technicians, to realise their vision. Taking care of the exhibits during the installation and exhibition period are of utmost importance. Lighting, spatial arrangement, and signage are all considered in an effort to enhance the viewer experience and to deliver an outstanding exhibition experience.
  4. Promotion and Outreach: Curators collaborate with marketing teams to promote the exhibition through social media and news outlets. Outreach efforts aim to attract diverse audiences and communities, offering physical and intellectual access to maximise engagement.

Curating and exhibition management represent the intersection of art, storytelling, and cultural stewardship. Curators shape our collective understanding of the world and enrich our cultural experiences. Their role remains crucial in preserving heritage, fostering innovation, and creating meaningful connections between art and society.

The next Curating and Exhibition Management short course at City will take place in October 2024.

For our full range of Creative Industry Short Courses, and all our other Short Courses, visit our home page HERE.

 

 

 

City Writes Creative Writing Spring 2024 Showcase Event Opens for Submissions

May 8, 2024 / / 0 Comments

City Writes guest and Novel Studio alumna, Lara Haworth.

This term’s City Writes showcase for all the wonderful writing coming from City’s short creative writing courses will feature the fantastically talented artist, debut author and Novel Studio alumna, Lara Haworth, on the 10th July at 7pm over Zoom.

Lara’s novel, Monumenta, will be published by Canongate on the 4th July, less than a week before City Writes. Set in Belgrade, Monumenta follows the fortunes of Olga Pavic and her family as her home is requisitioned for demolition. In place of the house, there will be a monument to a massacre, but with three possible horrors to commemorate, which will be memorialised and what secrets is Olga hiding from her children? You can pre-order your copy here.

To join Lara on the virtual stage, all you need to do is submit your best 1,000 words of creative fiction or non-fiction (we do accept young adult fiction but don’t currently accept children’s fiction) on any subject to rebekah.lattin-rawstrone.2@city.ac.uk with details of the City short course you are taking or have taken by midnight on Friday 14th June. Competition and submission guidelines can be found here.

We can’t wait to read your submissions and if you are keen to secure your place for the night, you can register for the event here. Good luck!

Here’s a Novel Idea

May 1, 2024 / / 0 Comments

Apply to the Novel Studio and join our growing list of published alumni.

The Novel Studio is City’s flagship novel writing programme which supports 15 selected students to work on their novels for a year.

The course has been the starting point for many successful novelists. From bestselling crime writer Harriet Tyce, whose fourth novel, A Lesson in Cruelty, was published with Wildfire earlier this month—and who generously initiated and funded our Novel Studio scholarship for four years—to debut novelist Lara Haworth, whose first novel, Monumenta, will be published with Canongate this summer, the Novel Studio has become recognised as a place to develop and grow as a writer.

From researching your ideas, plotting and planning to writing, editing and familiarising yourself with the publishing industry, the programme will guide you through the tricky terrain of novel writing.

Taught by established writers and editors, with opportunities to meet literary agents and publishing professionals, if you’re ready to take your novel writing to the next level, this course is for you.

As if that wasn’t enough, we offer a Literary Agent Competition for all successful applicants to the course, run in association with leading agent Lucy Luck at C&W Agency.

And for one talented writer from a low-income household, we have a fully-funded scholarship – The Captain Tasos Politis Scholarship.

Full details on all these opportunities and information on the course are available here.

Or you can apply directly with 2000 words of your fiction and a CV to Emily.Pedder.1@city.ac.uk

Deadline 30th June 5pm.

We look forward to reading your applications!

Essential Writing Tips for Accountants

April 25, 2024 / / 0 Comments

By Maria Sigacheva

‘Wizards’ of numbers and bookkeeping, accountants also spend time corresponding with clients and tax officials. Here are some tips on how to write well for non-accountants.

“Your reputation rides out with every letter you send,” states co-founder of the Plain English Commission, Martin Cutts. So how can you ensure that your readers understand your communications clearly and easily? Read on for three tips to improve your copy.

1)  Stick to a Simple Structure

An accountant’s letter to the tax office or to your client should be clear and well structured. Clarity can be improved by using a tried and tested three-part structure: an introduction, the main body copy, and a conclusion.

 

The introduction should summarise the purpose of the letter. Whether it’s about missing documents or querying financial statements, make it clear upfront.

The main body copy (two or three paragraphs) should detail your main points in a logical order. Avoid repeating the same information twice. Make sure you order events chronologically.

In your concluding paragraph, let the recipient know if you require a response and by which date. Add your contact details too, so that they can easily reach you for any queries.

2) Ramp up Readability

  • Use plain English, and remove any jargon, if possible.
  • Use active verbs, for example “we thought” instead of “after a careful thought.”
  • Avoid outdated words, like thereof, herein, hereof.

Being concise is a skill. Let’s look at an example of a recent letter about tax affairs. “Your current amount due according to the records held by the tax office is £10,000.” This could be rewritten for clarity as “The total due to the tax office is £10,000.”

In The Journal of Accountancy, business writing trainer Elizabeth Danziger writes: “Strive for an average sentence length of 10 to 18 words.” How? Remove all “as well as,” “but,” “that,” and “which” – and split overly-lengthy sentences. Get straight to the point and clients will praise you for saving them time!

 

3) Perfect your Punctuation

Grammarly is a useful proofreading tool. Just copy and paste your text and the software will instantly highlight any errors. It’s also a good idea to read your copy out loud to check punctuation and flow.

By adhering to these simple tips, you can start to improve your business writing – and relationships – today.

 

Maria Sigacheva is an Indirect Tax Manager at Glencore, and an Association of Chartered Certified Accountants ambassador for early careers.

Maria took our Introduction to Copywriting short course with Maggie Richards. As part of the course, students have the opportunity to pitch a blog idea for our site. If successful, the post will be edited and published on the site.

 

The next Copywriting course, which runs monthly, is in May. Maggie also runs our Writing for Business course which starts next week.

For all our courses, visit our homepage HERE.

City Writes Spring 2024 – Celebrating City’s Creative Writing Short Courses

March 28, 2024 / / 0 Comments

City Writes Spring 2024 Competition Winners Announced

March 15, 2024 / / 0 Comments

By Rebekah Lattin-Rawstrone

We are delighted to announce the winners of this term’s City Writes competition. City Writes is the showcase event for all the brilliant writing coming from City’s creative writing short courses and we have a fantastic line up for you this term on Wednesday 27th March at 7pm.

Reading at the event alongside published Novel Studio alumni Laurence Kershook and Katharine Light, our competition winners are: Jill Craig, Katie Hunt, Seyi Falodun-Liburd, Tess Pendle and David Strickland. Read on to find out more about our winners.

Current Novel Studio student, Jill Craig is originally from Northern Ireland, but currently lives and works as a secondary teacher in the North-West. She has lived in Greece and France and thinks often of going abroad again. An avid reader, she has published several short stories, with Freckle,  Egg & Frog and Literally Stories, and is working on the first draft of a novel.

Narrative Non-Fiction student Katie Hunt has been a journalist for more than two decades, working for several international news organisations including Reuters and BBC News. She lived in Asia for more than ten years, with stints in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Thailand. For the past four years, she has covered science and health for CNN in London. She hopes to write a non-fiction, popular science book about human origins focused on the latest discoveries in Asia.

Seyi Falodun-Liburd is a Nigerian campaigner and organiser from London. She is currently co-director of Level Up, a feminist campaigning community working towards a world where people of all genders are loved and liberated from bodily and systemic violence. She is also a member of Project Tallawah, a community resource for Black and Global Majority women and gender-expansive people in the UK. Seyi is a fledgling writer and Narrative Non-Fiction student who has written about gender-based violence for iNews, gal-dem and Refinery29.

Tess Pendle is a Narrative Non-Fiction student. After working for many years as a broker at Lloyd’s of London, Tess decided to contribute to a social project. She moved to Burkina Faso, where she worked for three years with a local women’s organisation to develop a microfinance programme supporting female entrepreneurs. On her return to the UK, she set up and managed both a national not-for-profit credit business and a £100 million government fund to invest in social enterprises. Tess is currently self employed and lives in Chelmsford with her partner.

An alumnus of the old Towards Publication course, now called Writers’ Workshop, D.P. Strickland is a neurodivergent writer with an MA in Creative Writing from UEA, whose work has previously appeared in anthologies and journals. He is particularly interested in underrepresented perspectives in fiction and recently completed a novel about a fundamental religion based on his own childhood experience. He lives in London and can be found on Instagram.

Now you know more about our winners, don’t forget to sign up for the event on Wednesday 27th March at 7.30pm on Zoom. You’ll be treated to stories of sticky summer heat, discoveries of ancient jaw bones, the disappointment of a young boy never quite right for the popular crowd and an exploration of the politics of our daily choices. All this alongside readings from our published authors, Laurence Kershook and Katherine Light. It’s going to be brilliant.

Register for tickets here and see you there.

And if anyone wants to come along and find out more about our writing courses, we are running a free taster session and open evening the night before City Writes. See here for more information about how to register.

Novel Studio alumna Katharine Light shortlisted for 2024 Selfies Book Awards

March 8, 2024 / / 0 Comments

We were delighted to discover that Novel Studio alumna Katharine Light has been shortlisted for the 2024 Selfies Book Awards for her debut novel, Like Me.

Launched by BookBrunch in 2018 to recognise excellence in the self-publishing market, the awards are sponsored by Ingram’s self-publishing platform, IngramSpark®, and are run in association with the London Book Fair and Nielsen BookData.

The winners will be announced at this year’s London Book Fair on Tuesday 12 March.

Also on the adult fiction shortlist with Katharine are Shooters by Julia Boggio, Ostler by Susan Grossey, Hidden Depths by Jason Mann, Darcy: A Pride and Prejudice Variation by Alice McVeigh, The Eagle and The Cockerel by Alan Rhode and Artificial Wisdom by Thomas R Weaver.

Katharine will be one of our guests at the spring term City Writes on 27 March, so if you want to hear her read and talk about her path to publication, do register here.

And if you want to find out more about the Novel Studio, the course Katharine took at City, come and meet one of our tutors, Rebekah Lattin-Rawstrone, who will be manning the Novel Studio enquiry desk at our free short course taster event on March 26.

Congratulations to Katharine and all the shortlisted writers. We look forward to hearing more next week!

Writing Short Courses Newsletter Spring 2024

February 29, 2024 / / 0 Comments

It’s pretty cold out still, but the snowdrops are here and spring is just around the corner…promise! For even more cheer, here’s the latest from our writing short course alumni and tutors.

The Novel Studio Alumni

 

Lara Haworth’s debut novel Monumenta is due out with Canongate in July. Pre-order here.

 

Jo Cunningham’s debut cosy crime novel Death by Numbers is due out with Hachette in August. You can pre-order here.

 

Katharine Light has been shortlisted for The Selfies 2024 in the adult fiction category for her novel Like Me.

 

Current Novel Studio student Jill Craig has been published in Eggplusfrog.

 

Peter Forbes’ Narrative Non Fiction alumnus Aniefiok Ekpoudom’s debut Where We Come From: Rap, Home & Hope in Modern Britain, was published by Faber last month. Jimi Famurewa reviewed it in The Evening Standard here.

Alumna Sophie Rutenbar, an expert on Haiti were she has worked, has won an International Affairs Fellowship from the US Council on Foreign Relations and is writing for the prestigious Brookings Institute.

 

Former City tutor Marcelle Bernstein’s Fact Based Storytelling alumnus Steve Young has published a book on Motherwell Cricket Club with Troubador publishing.

 

Susan Grossman’s Travel Writing alumna Yvette Cook has published an article in the Independent about travelling by train to Slovenia and another on Boscastle.

Tutor News

Writing for Children tutor Bryony Pearce has her debut Middle Grade novel, Hannah Messenger and the Gods of Hockwold, coming out in June 6, and she has sold a new YA fiction, Aphrodite (an Aphrodite retelling), which is due out in 2025. 

 

One-day Courses

There are plenty of options for anyone keen on one-day writing courses: our ever-popular Introduction to Copywriting with Maggie Richards is available monthly; while our Writing the Memoir course is now taught by the brilliant Anna Wilson. Our Writing for the Web and Digital Media continues to be run by the expert broadcast journalist Holly Powell-Jones; and the dynamic duo of Anna Tsekouras and Pete Austin, aka Anon Agency, run our Intro to Branding course.

Opportunities

Our year-long Novel Studio course for aspiring novelists is now open for applications for 2024/25 intake, with a deadline of 30th June 2024. All successful applicants are automatically entered into the Novel Studio literary agent competition, with the top three applications sent to Lucy Luck, literary agent at C&W Agency with a view to representation.

There is also a fully funded scholarship for the course, The Captain Tasos Politis Scholarship, available to a talented applicant from a low-income household.

Our Writing for Social Impact course continues to offer a scholarship for one young student (18-25) from an underrepresented background and/or facing financial difficulty. Please contact the tutor, Ciaran Thapar, for more information on this opportunity.

All current students of Introduction to Copywriting, Writing for Business and Narrative Non-Fiction courses are eligible to submit an idea for a blog post for short courses. If the idea is accepted, and the written piece meets our standards, it will be professionally edited and published on our blog.

City Writes

This spring sees the return of City Writes, our termly showcase for all the great writing talent coming out of the creative writing short courses at City. This term our guest authors will be Laurence Kershook and Katharine Light (see above) both alumni of the Novel Studio.

To join us at the event on March 27th at 7pm on Zoom, please register for free HERE.

And if you would like to enter the competition to win the chance to share the stage with Laurence and Katharine, please visit here for all the submission details. Deadline for entries is this Friday 1st March! That’s tomorrow!!

Writing Retreat

This May the Ruppin Agency Writers’ Studio is returning to Paris for another edition of our spring writing retreat. A literary agent and a published author and university lecturer are teaming up to guide writers through five days of focussed writing, offering individual feedback, advice and group exercises. They’re offering £200 off the full price to anyone who quotes PARIS2024 (or mentions where they heard about this).

Open Evening

And finally, we are running an open evening with taster sessions on March 26th at 6pm. There’ll also be a dedicated Novel Studio enquiry desk manned by tutor Rebekah Lattin-Rawstrone for anyone who wants to find out more about our flagship year-long course. Register HERE.

That’s all for now. Keep on writing and keep your stories coming into us. And huge congratulations to all our alumni and tutors.

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