A Writing Chance 2021-22

A Writing Chance 2021–22 Writers

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  Anna Maxwell

  Anna writes dramatic monologues, flash fiction and micro fiction. Her enthusiasm for dramatic monologues began in her late twenties, when she was a member of a women’s drama group in Lancaster, and she wrote and performed her own piece to an audience. Anna loves hard-hitting drama and is currently writing a six-episode series for screen using humour to explore current and controversial issues.

  Anna’s latest monologue, Square Peg, performed by Michael Sheen, is available on the BBC Sounds podcast, Margins to Mainstream.

  Anna wrote an article for The New Statesman in March 2022, which you can read here

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  Becka White

  Becka White works in the human rights sector. Before that, she spent many years subtitling live news on TV. Becka is a proud feminist, and mum to two young critical thinkers. Language is her first true (non-human) love. In her free time, she can be found cooking, reading, and leaving 40 minute voice-notes to her friends. Becka lives in south-east London, down the road from where she grew up. Her work has featured in the New Statesman and the BBC podcast ‘Margins to Mainstream‘. She is a winner of the London Writer’s Award 2022 for narrative non-fiction.

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  David Clancy

  Born in 1971, David is a hairdresser in the festival town of Ulverston. After years of hearing and telling stories orally David began to write them down; like all good hairdressers’ tales they are a balanced mix of fact and fiction. Concentrating mainly on LGBTQI+ lives, interests and issues David’s work has featured in both local and national publications and heard on BBC Radio Cumbria. David is currently working on his first novel.

  Read David’s article in the New Statesman here.

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  Elias Suhail

  Elias is a British-Moroccan writer and filmmaker; he lives in Folkestone, Kent, with his wife and two daughters.

  Elias’s recent film projects has received support from the BFI Network and the SAFAR Arab Film Development Programme. He is currently developing a collection of short stories concerned with themes of cultural margins and liminalities. Elias has a wide-ranging experience behind the scenes in the film and television industry, working for filmmakers such as Ken Loach and Joanna Hogg. He hopes to use his confluence of experiences to tell stories that offer a deeper understanding of the multiplicity of Arab and working-class identities.

  For further info go to elias-suhail.com

  Read Elias’s article for the New Statesman here.

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  Grace Quantock

  Grace Quantock is a writer and counsellor. Grace writes creative non-fiction; her work has been published in The Guardian, The New Statesman, The Daily Mirror and The Welsh Agenda. Grace was shortlisted for The Nan Shepherd Prize and the Artists and Writers Working Class Writers’ Prize 2021.

  She lives in Wales and loves journaling and calligraphy.

  Read Grace’s article for the A Dream of Britain issue of the New Statesman here.

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  Jaqueline Houston

  Jacqueline Houston was born in Galloway, Scotland in 1970. A factual television freelancer for two decades, she has powdered Giorgio Armani’s nose, pursued alien life-forms in India and been laughed at by a remote tribe in Tanzania for having ginger hair. Despite all this, she is entirely new to writing.

  She lives in Glasgow and likes having her knees punctured by old moggies.

  Most recently her work has featured in The New Statesman and on BBC Sounds.

  @JacquelineHoust

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  Maya Jordan

  Maya Jordan is a working-class writer living in Mid-Wales. After studying for a master’s in Creative Writing, Maya was awarded a place on A Writing Chance, a programme supporting working-class and under-represented writers, with Michael Sheen and New Writing North.

  She’s had work published in The New Statesman and is a regular writer for The Mirror’s parenting newsletter Lemon-Aid. She writes both fiction and creative non-fiction and her fiction was recently highlighted in the BBC’s Margins to Mainstream with Michael Sheen.

  She’s a keen library user and is passionate about access to creative arts for everyone, particularly disadvantaged communities.

  She is currently finishing her first novel, set in Newtown, Powys and has a weekly blog, Bordering Grey.

  Bordering Grey – Writings on life while I go grey here on the Welsh borders.

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  Mayo Agard-Olubo

  Mayo Agard-Olubo is a writer and poet based in London. He has been published in numerous anthologies and in the New Statesman. He writes fiction for children of all ages and is especially passionate about creating magical adventure stories for characters from backgrounds that have been historically ignored in children’s literature. As well as winning a place on A Writing Chance his unpublished picture book manuscript was longlisted for the inaugural Jericho prize, he was accepted into the HarperCollins Author Academy and is a winner of a London Writers Award in the YA/Children’s writing category. He is currently working on a Young Adult novel called We Must Slay Giants that explores themes such as climate change and colonialism through a steampunk fantasy setting.

  You can read Mayo’s articles for the New Statesman here and The Bookseller here.

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  Stephen Tuffin

  Stephen was born in 1958 on a council estate on the south-east coast of England. A former butcher’s boy, cook, cab driver, door-to-door salesman, care home assistant, road worker and builder, he now teaches creative writing. Aged 40, his world was flipped arse-upwards when he was diagnosed with an arthritic condition that meant he could no longer earn his keep as a carpenter. By the time he was 50 he had two degrees and a part-time job teaching. He is a working-class writer writing working-class stories inspired by the remarkable and raw world he has lived and worked in for most of his life. He loves his family, his mates, his cats Claude and Noah, the blues, beer, books, writing and the occasional roll-up. He lives in Swindon.

  Read Stephen’s article for the New Statesman here.

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  Tammie Ash

  Tammie is a writer from Bradford and a freelancer working in unscripted TV. She was part of the inaugural ‘A Writing Chance’ scheme at New Writing North in 2021 as well as the HarperCollins Author Academy in 2021. Her work was shortlisted for the Golden Egg Award and Commended for the FAB Prize in 2023. She’s passionate about championing and telling the stories of underrepresented voices, particularly the working-class and people of colour. As a freelance journalist, she’s written for The New Statesman and VICE.

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  Tom Newlands

  Tom Newlands is a Scottish writer living in London. He is a winner of the London Writer’s Award for Literary Fiction, the Creative Future Writer’s Award and New Writing North’s A Writing Chance. He is an alumnus of several writer development programmes including Penguin WriteNow, Creative Future Next Up, and the Curtis Brown Breakthrough Novel Scheme. In his writing Tom is interested in exploring disability, class consciousness and material culture and he is passionate about bringing warmth and humour to difficult subject matters. Tom is also a painter and visual artist and before starting to write worked as an auction consultant and art technician. He is currently writing a second novel, under the mentorship of David Peace.

  Read Tom’s article for the New Statesman here.