Mentors

Sarah Bower is the author of two historical novels, The Needle in the Blood (Susan Hill’s Novel of the Year 2007) and The Book of Love. She has also published short stories in a number of literary magazines including QWF, Spiked and The Yellow Room. She has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia and was shortlisted for the Curtis Brown scholarship for 2001/2002. She teaches creative writing at UEA and for the Open University. She edited The Historical Novels Review for two years and remains a regular contributor to the magazine and its sister publication, Solander.

Su Box specialises in children’s books (fiction and non-fiction). She spent many years as an editor and commissioning editor for both mass-market and smaller independent publishers before taking up a freelance career. As well as editing the work of established children’s authors, she is experienced in assessing manuscripts and ‘nurturing’ new writers. She has also written more than 30 books for younger children, including You Are Very Special (still in print after more than 12 years) and The First Rainbow.

Tom Bromley has been working in publishing for over ten years, including five years as a commissioning editor for both Little, Brown and Anova Books. He is the author of eight books: the novels Crazy Little Thing Called Love and Half A World Away (Pan Macmillan), We Could Have Been the Wombles (Penguin), The Encyclopedia of Guilty Pleasures and Shopping While Drunk (John Murray); Rock and Pop Elevens (Michael O’Mara) and two ghostwritten works.

Tim Clare is a writer, stand-up poet and musician, who performs all over the UK. His book about thwarted ambition, We Can’t All Be Astronauts, is published by Ebury Press. He has written for the Guardian and The Times, presented the Channel 4 series How To Get A Book Deal, and has appeared on Radio 1 and 2. He’s performed at many festivals including Glastonbury, Leeds and Reading, and Latitude.

Rose Gaete is a freelance editor. She has extensive editorial experience including several years working as an agent at the Wylie Agency where she was responsible for nurturing, advising and editing first time writers before submitting their work to publishers. Now she works for a variety of publishers, agents and literary scouts, including HarperCollins and Bloomsbury, as a reader and editor, as well as working independently to advise unpublished writers on their work. She has an MA in English Literature from Cambridge University and specializes in contemporary fiction. She lives in London and has three young children.

Rodge Glass lives in Glasgow. His first novel, No Fireworks, was published by Faber and Faber in 2005 and was nominated for four awards. His second novel Hope for Newborns was also published by Faber and Faber, in Summer 2008, and was followed several months later by Alasdair Gray: A Secretary’s Biography. This was published by Bloomsbury and won the 2009 Somerset Maugham Award for Non-Fiction, also being nominated for the Scottish Arts Council Non-Fiction Book of the Year. A more academic version of this book was submitted as Rodge’s PhD thesis at Glasgow University – he graduated in December 2008. After spending two years as Writer in Residence, he has now become a Lecturer in Creative Writing at Strathclyde University. Recent projects include being Editor on The Year of Open Doors (Cargo), a widely acclaimed collection of short stories featuring young Scottish writers, which was also released as an audiobook on Chemikal Underground Records, and Dougie’s War (Freight), a graphic novel Rodge wrote with Dave Turbitt about PTSD in soldiers returning from Afghanistan, based on months of research. Rodge has written journalism for the Herald, the Guardian and the Independent. His next novel is about Manchester United.

Sara Maitland is a writer of considerable stature. Her first novel, Daughter of Jerusalem (1978), won the Somerset Maugham Award, and her fifth, Home Truths (1992) was shortlisted for the Scottish Writer of the Year Award. She has also published four collections of short stories – one story, A Fall from Grace, is anthologised in The Penguin Book of Modern Women’s Short Stories, (Penguin 1990). On Becoming a Fairy Godmother and a collection of short stories have been published by Maia Press.

Sara is also a theologian and has published a wide range of non-fiction, as well as writing for radio and television. Sara is currently exploring ways of being a modern ‘solitary,’ and the contemporary meanings of silence. A Book of Silence was published by Granta in 2008.
Sara Maitland worked closely with TLC in setting up the Chapter and Verse mentoring scheme and was fundamental in its establishment. She has a wealth of experience in the field, including working on The British Council’s Crossing Borders Mentoring Scheme, as well as on Lancaster University’s Creative Writing distance learning MA. She is co-author of The Write Guide: Mentoring – The Essential Handbook for Emerging and Established Writers.

Miranda Miller has published five novels as well as short stories and interviews. Her last novel, Loving Mephistopheles (Peter Owen 2007), is a literary fantasy and she has also published realistic fiction. She is currently working on a historical fantasy, Nina in Utopia. Miranda has taught Creative Writing for the WEA and joined The Literary Consultancy as a mentor two years ago. She has travelled widely and now lives in London.

Jane McNulty has been a freelance television scriptwriter since 2000, with screen credits for episodes of various long running series including EastEnders, Doctors, Crossroads, Heartbeat and Peak Practice. She was also commissioned to write a short film for BBC2. She has taught at several universities (prose and scriptwriting) and currently lectures at Manchester Metropolitan University and on the MA in Scriptwriting at the University of Salford.

She also works with students in FE and HE colleges, and at secondary schools. Jane is also a reader for NAWE and runs courses and workshops throughout the north west of England and Scotland. For four years she was a senior creative writing tutor for the Open College of the Arts. In 1999 she graduated with distinction from the MA in Imaginative Writing at Liverpool John Moores University, where she also won the Lynda La Plante Award for best original screenplay (1998). Her award-winning dramatic monologues, short stories and poems appear in various anthologies. She is currently working on a stage play set during the Troubles in Northern Ireland.

Antonia Parkin has worked for several years as a children’s book editor at Frances Lincoln Publishers. She has a wide range of expertise covering poetry, story books and fiction and non-fiction picture books. She is also a freelance writer of educational books for children and a translator. Among her recent publications are translations of Jacques Duquennoy’s award-winning French picture books Ghost Party and Loch Ness Ghosts. She lives on the Wirral with her family.

Meg Peacocke has written poetry throughout her long life, beginning her career twenty five years ago with Peterloo Poets. They have now produced four collections of her work. In 2005 she received a Cholmondeley Award “for distinction in poetry”. Meg’s writing is much influenced by music and the visual arts. Her life is a rural one, and she greatly enjoys one-to-one tuition and mentoring.

Ray Robinson is an acclaimed young British novelist and award-winning short-story writer. He was born in North Yorkshire in 1971 and now lives in Manchester. Ray is a graduate of Liverpool School of Art, where he studied Graphic Design, and is a post-graduate of Lancaster University where he was awarded a Ph.D. in Creative Writing in 2006. Ray’s debut novel, Electricity, was published to public and critical acclaim and was shortlisted for the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and the Authors’ Club Best First Novel Award. Ray’s second novel, The Man Without (Picador), was published in July.  Ray’s third novel, Forgetting Zoe (Random House), was published to critical acclaim in 2009. The Irish Times called it ‘an uncompromising novel of alarming power’ and said Ray was ‘among the most impressive voices of Britain’s younger generation.’
His short-stories are also widely published in literary journals such as Transmission and Succour magazine and have received numerous awards including the Phillip Good Memorial Prize for his short-story Cut. Ray has lectured at Lancaster University and for The Open University.

Sibyl Ruth‘s first poetry collection, Nothing Personal, was published in 1995 by Iron Press. A chapbook, I Could Become That Woman (Five Leaves), followed in 2003. Her poems have appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies, and have been broadcast on Radio and TV. From 1998-9 she was Birmingham city’s Poet Laureate. In recent years her work has diversified to include both fiction and drama, as well as literary translation and feature journalism. She has taught creative writing for the Open College of the Arts and the University of Birmingham’s Centre for Lifelong Learning. From 2000-2005 she organised the literature programme at mac (the Midlands Arts Centre). She is a member of the editorial advisory panel of Tindal Street Press. Sibyl won first prize in the 2008 Mslexia Poetry Competition.

Susannah Waters started her professional life as an opera singer, performing principal roles in many of the world’s leading opera houses. Since 2002, she has been a writer and stage director. Her first novel, Long Gone Anybody, was published by Black Swan in 2004, and short-listed for the Pendleton May Award. Her second novel, Cold Comfort, was published by Doubleday in 2006, and featured on Radio 4′s Today programme as one of the first fictional novels dealing with the effects of climate change. She is currently working on her third. In 2003, she founded the multi-art form production company, The Paddock, for whom she frequently devises, commissions and directs work, and whose most recent project was a new site-specific opera by Orlando Gough performed in a disused warehouse. She is an Associate Tutor in Creative Writing at the University of Sussex, as well as a regular tutor for the Arvon Foundation.

Tessa West initially trained as a teacher, but her interest took a different turn when she began to teach in prisons. This led to her becoming an assistant governor and, later on, an Independent Member of the Parole Board. Her non-fiction book Prisons of Promise was published by Waterside Books. The first creative writing she did was poetry, but she has successfully self-published three novels, The Estuary, The Reed Flute and Companion to Owls. Each of these is set in East Anglia, where she has lived all her adult life. Tessa was one of the first mentors at TLC, work she currently combines with her own writing (she’s well into her fourth novel) and her second year as a student on the MA course Writing the Visual at Norwich University College of the Arts.