Catherine Menon is Australian-British, has Malaysian heritage and lives in London. She is a University lecturer in robotics and has both a PhD in pure mathematics and an MA in Creative Writing. Fragile Monsters is her debut novel.

Her short story collection, Subjunctive Moods, was published by Dahlia Publishing in 2018. Her short stories have won or been placed in a number of competitions, including the Fish, Bridport, Bare Fiction and Short Fiction Journal awards. Her work has been broadcast on radio, and she’s been a judge for several international short fiction competitions.

Courttia Newland is the author of nine books including his debut, The Scholar and the story collection, Cosmogramma. His work has appeared in many anthologies and been broadcast on BBC Radio 4. He is co-editor of the seminal IC3 The Penguin Book of New Black Writing in Britain, spanning poetry, short fiction, memoir and essays. As a screenwriter he has co-written for the awarding winning BBC series Small Axe and The Woman in the Wall. He has a PhD in Creative Writing from Kingston University and his latest novel, A River Called Time (2021), was shortlisted for the Arthur C Clarke Award Science Fiction Book of the Year in 2022. His essay collection, The Art of Opposition: On Hope, Resilience, and Creative Expression Beyond the Mainstream publishes with Faber and Faber, July 2026.

Deepa’s debut novel Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line was named as one of the best books of the year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time and NPR. It won the Edgar Award for Best Novel and was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2020. Time included it in ‘The 100 Best Mystery and Thriller Books of All Time’. It has been translated into over twenty languages.

Anappara is the co-editor of Letters to a Writer of Colour (2023), a collection of personal essays on fiction, race, and culture. 

Her second novel, The Last of Earth, was one of BBC’s ‘12 books to read in 2026’.

She was born in Kerala, southern India. Her journalism on the impact of poverty and religious violence on the education of children won the Developing Asia Journalism Awards, the Every Human has Rights Media Awards, and the Sanskriti-Prabha Dutt Fellowship in Journalism. 

Edward Hogan was born in Derby in 1980 and now lives in Brighton. He is a UEA creative writing graduate and a recipient of the David Higham Award. His first novel, Blackmoor, was shortlisted for The Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award, the Dylan Thomas Prize and won the Desmond Elliot Prize. His second novel, The Hunger Trace, also published by Simon & Schuster, was shortlisted for the 2012 Encore Award. He is also the author of two novels for young adults, Daylight Saving, which was shortlisted for the 2013 Branford Boase Award, and The Messengers both published by Walker Books. His latest novel, The Electric, was published by John Murray in 2020. His short stories have been shortlisted for the BBC National Short Story Award, the V.S Pritchett Prize, and the Manchester Fiction Prize. 'Single Sit' won the Galley Beggar Press Prize 2021, and 'Late Velvet' won the Dinesh Allirajah Prize in 2025. 

Emily’s debut novel, A Tiny Speck of Black and then Nothing, is published by Manilla Press and came out earlier this year (2026). Set in the Japanese city of Osaka in the early 2000s, it tells the story of two young women  – Anna and Loll, an English language teacher and a nightclub hostess  – and what happens when one of them suddenly disappears.

Emily is also the author of the group biographies Out of the Shadows: Six Visionary Victorian Women in Search of a Public Voice and A Secret Sisterhood: The Literary Friendships of Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontё, George Eliot, and Virginia Woolf (cowritten with Emma Claire Sweeney).

A winner of the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize, Emily’s journalism has appeared in The Times, the Washington Post, the Daily Telegraph and TIME. She has lived in Japan and the UK, and is currently based in Washington DC.

Heidi James is a prize-winning author, essayist, poet and podcaster. Her critically acclaimed novels include: The Mesmerist’s Daughter, Carbon, Wounding, So The Doves, and most recently, The Sound Mirror which has been described as ‘An exhilarating, heart-rending work’ by The Irish Times and as ‘An exceptional novel’ by The Guardian. She hosts the wonderful podcast, First Graft, inspiring and supporting all creatives with their first draft anxieties. She lectures in Creative Writing and English Literature and hosts writing and artists retreats in Sussex.

Hester Musson's debut novel, The Beholders, was a Times bestseller, a Sunday Times historical book of the month and shortlisted for the HWA Debut Crown in 2024. Her second novel, The Night Hag, was published in February 2026.

She grew up in Leicestershire and studied English Literature at Bristol University, later completing a master's in drama at the RCS in Glasgow. She was an actress and autocue operator (among other things) in London before writing full time and now lives in Scotland. https://www.hestermusson.com/

As a child, Kiare wanted to live on a farm, run an orphanage and be on stage. As an adult, she found herself working for academics, with prisoners and on nightshifts. Her short stories have been published in anthologies, broadcast on the radio and shortlisted in competitions, including the BBC National Short Story Award. Nightshift, about one woman’s obsessive interest in another, is her first novel, written while studying for a PhD. She grew up in South Africa and lives in London.

Lara Haworth is a writer, visual artist and filmmaker. 

​Her debut novel, Monumenta, was published by Canongate in July 2024.

​Her literary work is represented by Jo Bell at Bell Lomax Moreton.

​She is a recipient of a Bridport Prize 2022 for her story, Monumenta, adapted from her novel of the same name.

​Her films have been selected for festivals including Japan International, Belgrade Film, New York Tri-State and Munich New Wave. She received the LGBT award for best film at Athens Monthly Film Festival.

​Her visual work has shown internationally at venues in Japan, Canada, Switzerland and Germany.

​​​She lives in London, UK.