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RLF Writers’ News: October 2025

Publishing

Miranda Moore’s new novel A Beautiful, Terrible Thing is published in October by David Fickling Books.

It tells the story of Cara, who is grieving the death of her younger brother Si in a car crash. Three months later, as she’s trying to find her way back, she meets Nathan. Gorgeous, smart and kind, she feels a freedom when she’s with him. But he’s hiding a huge secret – his world broke three months ago too, when he ran a red light and killed a boy.

Cynthia Rogerson’s new novel 100,000 Birthdays, which is published this month, begins on the first birthday of the narrator, and rewinds to the first birthday of her (many times great) grandfather – a microbe called Kevin bobbing in a not-very-salty sea.

Published by Sparsile Books, the book is part memoir, part philosophical musing and part ode to the universe. 100,000 Birthdays will leave you marvelling at the interconnectedness of all things — and profoundly grateful to Kevin the microbe.

Zoë Howe’s revised and expanded Visions, Dreams and Rumours: A Portrait of Stevie Nicks was released on 2 October by Omnibus Press, as part of their Remastered series.

The Washington Post said of the book – which documents Stevie’s life and features interviews with some of Stevie’s associates and collaborators from over the years – “Howe documents it all the sex, the drugs and the mystification with the nonjudgmental vigilance of a devoted fan.”

Also includes a foreword by Vivien Goldman.

Midge Gillies new book Atlantic Furies: The Women Who Risked Everything to be the First to Fly is out now.

It follows the adventures of the first female aviators – Elsie Mackay, Lady Anne Savile, Frances Grayson, Ruth Elder, Amelia Earhart and Mabel Boll  – who risked everything to prove that women could fly in the early 20th century, when the dream of crossing the Atlantic by air was as potent as putting a man on the moon 50 years later.

Midge will also be giving a lunchtime lecture about the book at the RAF Museum’s Midlands Site on 21 October at 12pm. Find out more and buy tickets here.

Pete Kalu‘s latest book Act Normal: Joy and Despair in Postcolonial Britain is out on 23 October.

A memoir told through fragmented memories, vivid imagery, and introspective musings, Act Normal sees Kalu explores a range of themes, from the joys and anxieties of childhood to the complexities of adult relationships, career struggles, and the enduring search for meaning.

Pete will also be at The House of Books and Friends in Manchester to on the evening of 23 October to celebrate the launch of Act Normal. Tickets and information available here.

Broadcasts

Andrew Miller was recently interviewed on BBC Radio 4 Front Row, to coincide with announcement of the 2025 BBC National Short Story Award with Cambridge University (BBC NSSA) shortlist, which includes his short story Rain: a history.

As the prestigious award celebrates its 20th anniversary, this year’s shortlist was praised for its “intimate, elegant and nuanced explorations of relationships, community and the specificities of place set against a world in crisis”. Emily Abdeni-Holman, Colwill Brown, Edward Hogan and Caoilinn Hughes were the other finalists, and judges included RLF Fellow Lucy Caldwell.

You can listen to Andrew’s interview here, and hear his shortlisted story, Rain: a history, read by Toby Jones on BBC Sounds.

Productions

Nicola Baldwin’s new play WASTELAND, supported by the Adopt A Playwright Award and MGC futures has a rehearsed reading at the Criterion Theatre, Piccadilly on 9 October at 1:30.

“It’s 2AM. An academic, a student and a cleaner walk into a university. By 3AM, Lou, Jess and Rosa are trapped. …At 8AM they walk out changed. A sparkling new building is about to have its official opening and university bosses are fretting over tidying away a cleaners’ strike before the press arrives. Nobody could anticipate the chain of farcical events triggered by these three women that leads inexorably to the question: what is the point of sustainable products if people are dispensable?”

Stephen Sharkey‘s new adaptation of Bertolt Brecht’s The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui will be part of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s 2026 season.

Brecht’s riotous 1941 gangster spectacle is a blistering satire on Hitler’s ascent to power. The new adaptation will be Seán Linnen’s RSC directorial debut and will star Mark Gatiss as the Notorious Arturo Ui.

The show is set to open in April 2026. Tickets are on sale now.

Events and appearances

Claudine Toutoungi will be one of the guest readers at The Poetry Review’s Autumn Issue Launch on Wednesday 8 October, at The Poetry Cafe in London. More information here.

John Siddique hosts Malcolm X: A Deeper Purpose at Birmingham Rep on 11 October with writers Kehinde Andrews, Sue Brown and Bonnie Greer.

The event is presented by Birmingham Literature Festival in association with WritersMosaic to mark the centenary of the birth of Malcolm X and remember his legacy in a world that increasingly insists on dividing us. 

More information and tickets available here.

On 12 October Jo Bell is appearing at Birmingham Literature Festival to talk about her twenty years spent living on England’s waterways, and her memoir Boater. Tickets available here.

Also on 12 October, Jo will be running a poetry workshop, Smoke and Mirrors, for Birmingham Literature Festival at Birmingham Conservatoire. Find out more here.

Mimi Khalvati is giving this year’s Rylands Poetry Reading at Manchester Literature Festival on 23 October.

The annual Rylands Poetry Reading is presented in partnership with the Centre for New Writing and Creative Manchester. The author of ten poetry collections, Mimi founded The Poetry School, and was awarded the 2023 King’s Gold Medal for Poetry and was the Jhalak Poetry Prize 2025. Her award-winning lyrical poetry has been inspired by everything from her Persian background to her travels in the Mediterranean. Find out more about her Rylands Poetry Reading here.

On 24 October Mimi will also be running The Line Break Poetry Workshop at John Rylands Research Institute and Library as part of the Manchester Literature Festival. Buy tickets here.

Also at Manchester Literature Festival, John Siddique will host WritersMosaic poets and co-editors Mona Arshi and Karen McCarthy Woolf and T.S. Eliot Prize-winner Roger Robinson to reflect on Nature Matters, the new Faber anthology, and explore the deep connections between earth, spirit, and the human experience from a perspective too often underrepresented in the genre. 

The event will be at Manchester Central Library on 24 October. More information can be found here.

As part of Sheffield’s Off the Shelf Festival of Words, John Siddique will also host Diverse Islands: British and Irish Multiculturalism, a discussion with Black and Brown British and Irish writers Kieran Connell, Emer O’Neill and Charlotte Rea-Patel. Presented by WritersMosaic in association with Speaking Volumes, the event takes place on 25 October.

For information and to buy tickets, visit the Off the Shelf Festival website.

At the end of October Zoë Howe and conservationist and wildlife presenter Ajay Tegala will present a Halloween version of their illustrated spoken word show Witching the Wild Year. They will be appearing at the (haunted) Talbot Hotel in Oundle, Northamptonshire, on 30 October and the Kirk Theatre, Pickering, North Yorkshire on 31 October. Howe and Tegala’s book Witching the Wild Year will be published in 2027 by The History Press.

RLF panel events

Later this month, some of our RLF writers will be appearing at libraries and local community spaces throughout the UK for a series of conversations inspired by topics in the RLF Collected audio archive, followed by questions from the audience. Speakers and topics include:

• Christy Ducker, David Mark and Harry Man on the places that inspire their writing, at City Library, Sunderland, on Wednesday 8 October. Tickets here.
• Clare Fisher, Amanda Dalton and Testament on writers block, at The Leeds Library on Saturday 11 October. Tickets here.
• Mark Illis, Amanda Dalton and Jonny Wright on getting published, at The Leeds Library on Saturday 11 October. Tickets here.
• Chris Simms, Susan Elliot Wright and Mark Morris on their writing process, at the Crystal Peaks Library in Sheffield on Wednesday 15 October. Tickets here.
• Leila Rasheed, Juliet Clare Bell and Helen Kelly on writer’s block and rejection, at the Grounded Earth Café in Birmingham on Thursday 16 October. Tickets here.
• Chris Simms, Carys Bray and Lizzie Nunnery on the role of nature in their writing, at Liverpool Central Library on Friday 17 October. Tickets here.
• Amanda Dalton, Pete Kalu and Zoe Howe on the impact of the urban environment on their writing at The Book Corner in the iconic Piece Hall, as part of the Halifax Town Festival, on Sunday 19 October. Tickets here.

Awards

Satinder Chohan and Claudine Toutoungi are among ten writers awarded residencies in the inaugural presentation of the 2025 RSL Scriptorium Awards.

Founded and generously supported by President Bernardine Evaristo, the RSL Scriptorium Awards provide free writing residencies in a cottage on the Kent coast for up to a month, offering uninterrupted time for professionally active writers to focus on their projects. Each writer will also be awarded a bursary to support them taking up their residency. 

Wren James is the Children’s Winner and overall runner up in the World of Books Sustainable Story Award 2025 for their book Anarchy on the Atlantic Express, a near-future mystery set on the maiden voyage of the first transatlantic train, in which a disenchanted teen investigates a shocking break-in to the luggage compartment of the luxury, eco-friendly ocean hopper. The prize was presented by Piers Torday.

Roy Williams’ Gatsby in Harlem has been shortlisted for Best Adaptation in the inaugural British Audio Awards ‘Speakies’.

Produced by Granny Eats Wolf, Gatsby in Harlem is a bold, reimagined audio adaptation of F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Williams’ reimagining of the story relocates the action from Long Island to 1920s Harlem during the Harlem Renaissance, highlighting the era’s cultural identity, social expression, and artistic ambition for Black Americans. Directed by Celia de Wolff it also received nominations for Best Ensemble and Best Performance for Ncuti Gatwa. More here.

Andrew Miller has been shortlisted for the 2025 Booker Prize, for his novel The Land in Winter, set in the West Country during the Great Freeze of December 1962.

Chair of the Booker Prize 2025 judges Roddy Doyle said: “The six [shortlisted books] have two big things in common. Their authors are in total command of their own store of English, their own rhythm, their own expertise; they have each crafted a novel that no one else could have written. And all of the books, in six different and very fresh ways, find their stories in the examination of the individual trying to live with – to love, to seek attention from, to cope with, to understand, to keep at bay, to tolerate, to escape from – other people. In other words, they are all brilliantly written and they are all brilliantly human.”

Alterations by Michael Abbensetts with additional material by Trish Cooke – which ran at the National Theatre earlier this year – has been nominated for four awards at The Black British Theatre Awards. The ceremony returns to London’s Piccadilly Theatre on 26 October. More information here.

Trish Cooke previously wrote about the experience of adapting Alterations for us here.

Kali Theatre has appointed Aisha Zia as its new artistic director.

Aisha said: “I’m honoured to join Kali Theatre as its new artistic director and build on the remarkable work that has gone before. My vision is for Kali to be more than a platform for new writers – I want it to be a home for leaders and theatremakers, with Kali hubs across the UK. My door will always be open. Together, we will create bold, groundbreaking work.”

Kali Theatre Company was founded in 1991 by RLF Fellow Rukhsana Ahmad, with a deep commitment to platforming South Asian voices.

Having previously been longlisted for this year’s Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction, it has just been announced that JB Priestley Award recipient Adam Weymouth and former RLF Trustee Richard Holmes have both now been shortlisted for the award.

Adam Weymouth’s Lone Wolf: Walking the Faultlines of Europe and Richard Holmes’ The Boundless Deep: Young Tennyson, Science and the Crisis of Belief are two of six books to have made the shortlist. They join writers Jason Burke, Helen Garner, Justin Marozzi and Frances Wilson.

You can find out more about the shortlisted books here.

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