"The Armour of Fiction Versus the Sword of Reality": My Creative Writing Dissertation

By Kimaya Tushar Patil

Hi! I'm Kimaya, I'm 22, and I've recently been awarded my MA in Creative Writing from the University of Leicester. I'm originally from the city of Pune, in India, and I graduated from Fergusson College with a BA in English Literature in 2024 (2:1).

My final dissertation for the MA was a prose-based Creative Writing project which highlighted the political turmoil we face in a society that manipulates information to control and divide its citizens, and how we, as recently inducted adults, learn to navigate this chaos on finding ourselves in such an uncertain environment. For my dissertation, I submitted the first six chapters of the first book of what I have planned to be a trilogy.

My undergraduate project had to be done in a group and was purely research based (we applied Allen Tate's "Theory of Tension" to Dante's Inferno), so I was glad to have free rein this time around, as my Master's dissertation allowed me to combine research with my original work. 

The themes of my work were inspired by the current world events unfolding in the previous and ongoing decade. We have been through so much as a society; battling precarious geo-political conflicts, global pandemics, and corrupt leaderships. And yet, in spite of all the chaos, we are trying to not only persevere, but to find ourselves as we enter a new stage of life. My submission focused on the themes of 1) individual morality vs. social indoctrination, 2) identity and belonging, and 3) the construction of a false reality through propaganda and class division. 

As for the genre, while never having worked with fantasy before, it was the only one that felt right to be able to bear the weight of the themes being explored. It gave me the chance to probe further into these issues. My book would be classified in terms of the newly popular "New Adult" category, in the genre of political-fantasy with a romantasy sub-plot. The "New Adult" category is fairly recent development, and usually falls between the "Young Adult" and "Adult" categories, aiming for audiences between 18-25 years of age. 

The first book follows 22-year-old Oriana Seravelle, as she navigates her life as a new adult. As the adoptive daughter of the decorated army General of Elydris, Oriana has big shoes to fill. Between training and honing her ability to wield shadows, and her ageing father retiring soon, she is trying her best to be worthy of his legacy. Just when her father agrees to let her take on some more serious responsibilities, she comes across a mysterious stranger who threatens to turn her world upside down. 

During my dissertation I found myself struggling with scene edits, as well as stylistic edits. With scenes, I often struggled to maintain the delicate balance between mystery and revelation. I also often spent too much time focusing on minute details of particular scenes. I have learned, though, that it is best to know just enough about a scene to make sure it can be converted into a rough draft. That way there is at least something to edit later. 

Here are a few general tips for writing at university I feel I've picked up along the way:

• Write whatever you can. It doesn't matter if it is 50 words or 500. It does not necessarily have to be a perfect draft.
• Perfect drafts are a MYTH. And imposter syndrome is real, although it is good to remind yourself that you have your own unique timeline to accomplish your goals!
• Go through your curriculum well before your classes begin and email your tutors in case of any queries. (They are always happy to help you!)
• While navigating the busy schedule of a post-graduate degree, organisation is key! (Don't be shy to use that note-taking app, and the scheduling calendar. They are lifesavers).

Below, you can read a short excerpt from my MA Creative Writing Dissertation.

 

From Chapter Two

The moon is high by the time I make my way across the town and to the outskirts near the cliffs. The Fortress is a daunting structure in the distance. Its security is second best, only to its geographical advantage, which makes it inescapable, by foot or by water. Hewn from stone, the structure is deeper than it is taller, overlooking the steep drop to the jagged shoreline and deep waters below. 

Shadows dance along the walls as I climb the steps to the entrance. The two stationed guards exchange skeptical looks, but let me pass after handing me the roster of the cells. The darkness seems to close in the deeper I go, the dampness of mildew coating my senses in an invisible cloak. The sound of my boots is the loud compared to the occasional groan or yell coming from a distance. It takes my eyes a minute to adjust to the light that flickers from the carved hollow quartz stones, placed upon unevenly distanced sconces. I make sure to double-check every name and locking mechanism on each of the holding cells as I move deeper into the fortress. 

About forty cells in, the Fortress goes quiet; too quiet. I move cautiously, drawing a blade from its sheath, and take a left at the upcoming junction. I see something move in the shadows out of the corner of my eye. I turn around to find hollow darkness, but I sense someone standing in the shadows. There is more than one person here. Not guards. 

Five Years of Publishing Beyond the Mainstream: On Setting Up and Running Renard Press

By Will Dady

An unknown wit of years past asks, "How do you make a small fortune in publishing?" Of course the answer is, "Start with a large one!" 

I’m afraid I have to report that when we set up Renard Press we didn’t have a large fortune, just bags of passion, and somehow that, and stubbornness – and the book community’s kind support – has helped us make it to our first big milestone: five years of making books. We’ve not yet amassed that small fortune – but our bookshelves have grown rich indeed with tales from all corners of the globe. 

Setting up an indie press in April 2020 felt for a while like one of those acts which, viewed one way is a stroke of genius, viewed another is utter madness. In case you missed it, there was a pandemic on, and we were all confined to barracks – but as our first print rep said, "If you can get through this, you can get through anything." 

Despite the isolated nature of those months – years – of Covid, which I’m sure we’re all only too keen to try to forget, it was in some ways a good time to be stepping out in a new and positive light. Somehow we chanced on authors who trusted us with their words before we had a track record; and then readers, who were happy to pay good money for these little paper miracles. 

Over these five years there have of course been some hurdles, speedbumps, calamities – it’s famously difficult to keep a small press running and to achieve some sort of publicity cut-through without the huge budget that the Big Five enjoy, and let’s not even get into the disaster Brexit has wrought on exports and politics, and the turmoil of social media under new ownership. But there have also been such positives – a thriving bookish community, recognition through awards, lasting relationships with book lovers. 

At the end of last year we celebrated our fifth birthday with a wonderful, warm event in St Mary’s Islington, in a by turns hilarious and moving series of author readings, raising the rafters with lines from those first five years of publishing. 

The stats surrounding these years are quite startling. In total in our first half-decade we have published 165 books across our imprints, including 650 (living) writers, published in both single-author books and a shelf-full of anthologies, including many debut authors, and we’ve also planted some 2,500 trees. (Perhaps the last of these sticks out a bit here, but humour us – sustainability is a huge part of what we do).

Of course any press could – and will, in the age of AI – publish 165 crap books, regurgitating stolen words endlessly for the amusement and profit of the smug billionaires whose platforms promote such rot to the detriment of literature and the environment. But I’d like to think that Renard’s books are literary gems, soulful and unique, and each books sits proudly on the shelves in my office, as well as in countless bookshops and homes. There are points when a publisher stands at a crossroads, I think – most will counsel to follow the money; but a big part of what makes us different, in my eyes, is that we’re looking for different, and this means looking beyond the mass of published voices – for stories and writers who have fallen through the cracks, who aren’t flavour of the month, who aren’t seen in the mainstream. And when I talk to our subscribers, who receive a book every month, they talk about the joy of reading books they would never have found otherwise – and this is what keeps me going. "Variety is the soul of pleasure," said groundbreaking seventeenth-century writer and sometimes spy Aphra Behn – words to live by!

So it’s important to us that the list remains a broad church – from the outset we committed to gender equality in our commissioning, opting to avoid becoming another stale, male-dominated list, and I’m proud to see great and natural diversity in the shelves, be that religion, class, sexuality or cultural or ethnic context. Reading is, after all, one of the best ways to explore, to meet people and places we might otherwise not; so, like any diet, it should be varied. 

We celebrated our first five years with that Islington evening event, with crates of beer and a whole lot of authors – but we marked the occasion too with a thoughtful meditation in our Renard Press: Five Years anthology. This is a very special, limited edition of excerpts, which I hope will enchant readers, but also be lovingly preserved on bookshelves of book lovers. It is not designed to sit on a bookshop’s till point – or, indeed, in a nameless distribution city by the M1, ready for the space-going tech bro to peddle for peanuts. Even better, proceeds go to the phenomenal Bookbanks charity, who, by bringing books to foodbanks, are doing the really important work that the National Year of Reading aims for: breaking down barriers of privilege. Our partnerships with charities have been key to our work, and we strongly believe that there’s room for empathy in this big commercialised book world.

So if you’re reading this – thank you! – I hope you now know a bit more about Renard Press, and perhaps even about independent publishing – which, I remain convinced, is the antidote to our times. In an industry that is so busy navel-gazing that sales figures are considered the only important metrics in publishing reportage, how vital, how joyous, then, to be doing something different. Our first five years have been so broad in content and creativity, inspiring  and thought provoking, and we sit on the shoulders of our authors; for our part we shall continue to hold ourselves to account and aim to be a force for good, using our platform to publish beyond the mainstream, bringing together new worlds and voices that no longer have to hide their light. 

About the author
Will Dady grew up in the wonderfully named Great Snoring in North Norfolk, and now lives in London. He is the Publisher at Renard Press, and the founder of the Indie Press Network.

LJ Ireton, "Unclaimed"

LJ Ireton is a poet and a bookseller from London. She has a 1st Class B.A. Honours in English Language and Literature. Her poems have been published by over forty journals both in print and online, including: Green Ink Poetry, The Madrigal, Humana Obscura, Spellbinder Literary Magazine, Drawn to the Light, Acropolis Journal, Amphibian Literary Journal, Tiny Seed Journal, Black Bough, Spelt and Wild Greens Magazine. Her poetry features in the printed anthologies Spectrum (Renard Press, 2022), York Literary Review 2023 (Valley Press), Building Bridges (Renard Press, 2024), You’re Never Too Much (Macmillan, 2025) and on the BBC World Service Bookclub. Her debut poetry collection, Lessons from the Sky, was published by Ellipsis Imprints in February 2024, followed by Interlude in February 2025 by Haywood Books.

About Unclaimed, by LJ Ireton

These are lyrical, first person poems, which give voices to the bold and spirited Tudor and Stuart queens judged and condemned by history: Anne Boleyn, Catherine Howard and Mary, Queen of Scots.

You can read more about Unclaimed on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read a sample poem from the collection. 

From Unclaimed

Scotland 

          Mary, Queen of Scots

It was there. Hidden,
sleeping in my young soul
while I was scorning rocks
on curated tile.

I am awake now, and turning;
wild heather scales my bones, 
shedding my skin –
I was schooled in everything but
how earth-gold would respond
to my step 
returning,
humming at my feet —

my mourning veil
curls in the wildflowers;
they are reclaiming it
with teeth,
thistle purple sharp ghosts
arise,
my lungs smoke mist
moors and heights —

Scots King am I;
brocade and pearl
re-learning the beauty of thorns.

Elizabeth Baines, "Five Different Stories About One Thing"

Elizabeth Baines is the author of the novels The Birth Machine, Too Many Magpies and Astral Travel, and the story collections Balancing on the Edge of the World and Used to Be. She is also a prizewinning playwright for radio and stage, and an audiobook of her comedy radio series The Circle is published by Audible.

Elizabeth's website is here. 

About Five Different Stories About One Thing, by Elizabeth Baines
A ghost story, a love story, crime, science fiction and a postmodern story: here are the different experiences and attitudes of five linked characters, all affected by the same thing in the past. This is a slyly subversive experiment in genre, exploring the legacy of generational trauma.

You can read more about Five Different Stories About One Thing on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read an excerpt from one of the stories. 

From Five Different Stories About One Thing

Extract from "Home," a ghost story

As she opens the garden gate, something flicks, a crack in the light. A black bird flying up from the hedge.

"Male blackbird," says her twelve-year-old nephew, Sam. He has come up behind her with one of the boxes out of the van.

Her sister Sarah follows, carrying another. "Emma, it’s so quaint!"

They stand and survey the tiny terraced cottage, the place where she’ll be now, a single woman once more, beginning again. The stone walls, the deep-set little windows, their paint flaking, the uneven-looking slates on the roof. The unkempt garden, which Sarah says she’ll get in shape in no time, pale primroses half-hidden in the long grass. A cherry tree, its basket of still-bare branches glinting in the afternoon light.

Sam, mad on birds, mad on nature and science, peers into the hedge. "I bet there’s a nest."

Sarah’s husband and his mate lug in the bed and struggle with it on the angle of the narrow stone stairs.

Sarah spins in the little add-on kitchen. "You’ll be OK here." Big sister protector. Leaning back into the role she had in their childhood, their troubled childhood. It’s way in the past now, their father long dead and gone, yet here she is still playing the little sister-mother. "Lick of paint, new units, maybe, in time."

"Cool," says Sam, opening the iron door beside the fireplace in the one downstairs room, the old oven.

She would like them to go now. She wants to be alone with her new independence, and to savour the house for herself.

At last, in a tangle of voices and banging van doors, they’re off, Sarah and her family away back to their impenetrable domestic life.

The atmosphere of the house sifts around her. Smells of wood and stone, a slight whiff of mould that, now the house is occupied, should soon be banished. A soft pressure of history. A new history for her to belong to, she thinks.

Something shifts in the room above, a sound like a shove, and for a split-second she thinks someone’s still there ...

Joanna Nadin, "When the World Ends"

 

Dr Joanna Nadin is a former broadcast journalist and special adviser to the Prime Minister. Since leaving politics she’s written more than 100 books for adults and children, including the Sunday Times bestselling Worst Class in the World series, the Flying Fergus series with Sir Chris Hoy, and the acclaimed Joe All Alone, which is now a BAFTA-winning BBC drama. She’s been nominated five times for the Carnegie Medal for Writing, and shortlisted for the Roald Dahl Funny Prize and twice for the Lollies. She’s an Associate Professor in Creative Writing at University of Bristol.

About When the World Ends, by Joanna Nadin
When the unthinkable happens to the planet, two ragtag groups of kids on opposite sides of England beat the odds and escape death. But they soon realise that the only way to be truly safe is to seek a place they've only heard about in stories. As their treacherous journeys unfold, can they help each other survive - even when the world is ending around them? 

You can read more about When the World Ends on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read an excerpt from the novel.

From When the World Ends

Be Prepared

The government said to 
stop using plastic and 
time all our showers and 
turn off the heating, but
it wasn’t enough. 

The government gave  
instructions to comfort us. 
To make us feel we stood 
a chance, when we haven’t got 
a single hope. 

 
Flood

You think it will be silent when it rises.
But it comes in a 
thunder and rush,
a clatter and clanking of 
cars smashing on lamp-posts and
the sides of fried chicken shops,
of things in the water that 
should be on land. 
And over it all,
car alarms and fire sirens, 
and the screaming of people
who know they are as good as
dead. 

 
Guess What

Everyone is an expert on
what will happen next. 

The navy, says Mrs Witter, who’s seen 
Chinooks on the TV so she 
knows what she’s talking about. 
The navy will take us to Culdrose or
Yeovil.

Armageddon Terry reckons the water will
sink by midweek and 
we’ll be able to rescue ourselves – 
our own handsome princes. 

The tourists only care whether
they’ll get a refund and when
they can post their one-star review and if
any trains will leave from Par or Liskeard. 

And all the while, me and Roshan play cards 
and try to guess who would win in a fight between
a dinosaur and Armageddon Terry,
while I try not to wonder where my mum is 
or if she is at all.

Anna Vaught, "All the Days I Did Not Live"

 

Dr Anna Vaught is an English and Creative Writing teacher and mentor, occasional lecturer, campaigner - and prolific author. Find her everywhere on social media as "Bookwormvaught." Links and further information here. 

About All the Days I Did Not Live, by Anna Vaught
After the death of her steady, constraining husband, Catherine discovers that grief can be a liberation. With her adult children appalled by her sudden transformations, and a strangely familiar presence in the house urging her on, she begins to test the boundaries of who she might become. A call arrives on her newly purchased phone – a widower, Alec, still dialling the number once owned by his dead wife. What follows is a transgressive, intoxicating relationship built on longing, lies and the hunger to feel alive. All the Days I Did Not Live is a haunting exploration of loneliness, taboo and the dangerous, but delicious, magic of reinvention – where freedom comes at a cost and even the ghosts refuse to stay quiet …

You can read more about All the Days I Did Not Live on the publisher's website here. Below, you can read an excerpt from the opening of the novella. 

From All the Days I Did Not Live

1.

Yesterday I dreamed of that taste again. I dreamed of a deferential early summer. A kind breeze. I had taken the unripe and forbidden pear from the grass in the orchard. For a few moments, I sat cradling it as he watched. He had a camera and a scowl. In my dream, as on that hot day in the orchard, I lifted my chin and scowled back: it was the first time. Then I held the pear up, while his eyes said Do not dare; I held it up still further, before plunging it down to my mouth, biting into it lasciviously, though indeed it was unripe. 

As I said, it was the first time – the first time I had defied him – and in many dreams through my girlhood and all the way to middle age, and now, that dream comes back. I remember the sweet scratch of summer grass, wet, ardent on my bare feet. I am a teenage girl, shoulders back, the tart juice dripping down my chin. It is slightly obscene, and that is how I meant it. He does not move, and I think now, I can do anything. I feel, in defiance, that I am fully alive.

To this day a pear must be unripe, but yielding enough, and there must be juice, not only moisture. I must catch it at the right moment, if I can.

Yesterday I dreamed of that taste again. Of that time. Of my one invincible summer.

I dreamed at night, and then again when I awoke. Before I went to sleep, I thought I heard a drumming sound. I am used to that sound, I said to myself. Stress, anxiety: the blood pulsing and whooshing in your ears, then an irritation of tap, tap in your head, pinprick in your eye and a band snapping at your temples. 

But you see, I was wrong about that. And right before I drifted, with thoughts of that pear, the drumming sound was in the walls and under my bed. 

I am alive. I am fully alive.

Christmas News 2025

Our last News post was back in August. You can read it here. Since then, lots has been happening in the Centre for New Writing at the University of Leicester, so here is an update on student and staff news. Congratulations and thanks to everyone who helps make this such a vibrant community of writers. It really is a very special thing to be part of. And wishing everyone a very happy Christmas and New Year!

General News

Congratulations to all the MA Creative Writing students who successfully completed their course in September - a huge achievement!

We've held various guest lectures and public workshop over the last three months. These include a visit from Mr Shay, Leicester's first ever Poet Laureate (you can read more about his role here), a masterclass by Prof Kit de Waal ("Research Tips for Writers"), and a talk by Marco Volpe from Creative Computing on "Computational Storytelling." 

In December, we held a Christmas Creative Writing Research Seminar, open to all, in which PhD students Kathy Hoyle and Beth Gaylard gave excellent talks about their research. There were also some mince pies.  

Our review blog, Everybody's Reviewing, has now had well over one million readers. Thank to you everyone - our reviewers, interviewers, authors, editors and readers - involved. This blog, Creative Writing at Leicester, has now had well over half a million readers. Again, thanks to everyone involved!

Student and Staff News

Congratulations to PhD Creative Writing student Laura Besley whose story "Like a memory, or maybe only a dream" has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and whose story "We cannot know the dreams of absent fathers" won third prize in the Leicester Writes Short Story Prize 2025! Read more here and here, respectively. Laura's story "Love (A Journey)" has been published by Fictive Dream here. Laura's story "These Days, You're Kinda Okay" is published in Literary Namjooning here. 

Congratulations to MA Creative Writing graduate Constantine on the publication of his new book of short stories, Tales of the Charnwood. You can read more here. 

The Mad Road by PhD Creative Writing graduate Laurie Cusack has been reviewed in The Letter Press Project here. Laurie drafted The Mad Road as part of his PhD at Leicester. 

Congratulations to MA Creative Writing graduate Sam Dawson, whose story "Since the Fish Started Screaming" was shortlisted for the Aurora Short Fiction Prize 2025. Read more here. Sam's story "Dolly" was also longlisted for the Leicester Writes Short Story Prize. 

Congratulations to Kit de Waal, Professor of Creative Writing, who has been appointed a Fellow of the Society of Authors. Read more here. 

New Walk Editions, which is co-edited by Honorary Fellow in Creative Writing Nick Everett, has recently published two new pamphlets: The Morlocks by Mark Ford, and  À la Carte by Sean O'Brien. Read more on the publisher's website here. 

Tracey Foster, MA Creative Writing graduate, has had three of her haiku published in Madswirl Magazine here. Tracey's haiku "Gallery" is published on the Haiku Foundation website. 

Congratulations to PhD Creative Writing student Cathy Galvin, whose poetry collection Ethnology: A Love Song to Connemara will be published by Bloodaxe in February 2026. See more here. 

Congratulations to Kathy Hoyle, PhD Creative Writing student, whose story has been shortlisted for the Hammond House 2025 Literary Prize. You can see the shortlist here. 

As part of the University's Ukrainian Culture Week, final-year Creative Writing student Oleksandra Korshunova gave two excellent and moving poetry readings in the David Wilson Library. She read from and talked about contemporary Ukrainian poetry, and finished with a poem of her own. She performed the poems in both English and Ukrainian. You can read more about the Ukrainian Culture Week here.  

Congratulations to PhD Creative Writing student Mathew Lopez-Bland, who passed his viva in November!

Karen Powell-Curtis, PhD Creative Writing graduate, has written reviews for Everybody's Reviewing of Mary Bailey's Poems of a Nottingham Lace-Runner here, and Familiar Phantoms by Sue Forrester here. 

Congratulations to PhD Creative Writing student Rob Reeves, who passed his viva in November!

Congratulations to MA Creative Writing student Mithila Dutta Roy, whose story "A Father and a Tide" has been longlisted for the World History Encyclopedia Ink of Ages Fiction Prize. Read more here.  

Congratulations to PhD Creative Writing student Jane Simmons, who passed her viva in November!

Hannah Stevens, PhD Creative Writing graduate, has had her story "A Micro-Second of Silence" published by Fictive Dream here. 

Jonathan Taylor, Associate Professor of Creative Writing, has been co-editing, with Karen Stevens, a book of essays called Creative Writing and the Critical Commentary: Reflection, Influence and Process, which will be published in 2026. His short essays "The Role of Comedy in Short Fiction" and "On Relatability" have been published, respectively, in The Subtle Art of Short Fiction, ed. Isabelle Kenyon (Fly on the Wall Press), and Antae: A Journal of Creative Writing (read it here). He has written three reviews for The Morning Star here, here and here. He has given various readings and talks, including the Christmas address to the Arnold Bennett Society.   

Congratulations to Paul Taylor-McCartney, PhD Creative Writing graduate, whose first non-fiction book, Cornwall Uncharted: Mapping Cornwall’s Queer History of Concealment, Culture and Creativity, will be published by the History Press in June 2026, to coincide with National Pride Month. You can read more about Paul's work on his website here. Paul has written a review of White Road by Harry Whitehead for Everybody's Reviewing here. 

Associate Professor of Creative Writing Harry Whitehead's novel White Road was published in September and he embarked on a book tour, taking in several book festivals and other events from Scotland to Kent. The tour continues into 2026 (see more news and reviews here).  

Lisa Williams, MA Creative Writing graduate, has a story ("Hope") in a new anthology called Pocket Full of Posies: Shadow Children, edited by Parth Sarathi Chakraborty and Rasiika Sen. Read more about the anthology here. Lisa has written reviews for Everybody's Reviewing of FantasticLand by Mike Bockoven here and The Names by Florence Knapp here.  

Lee Wright, PhD Creative Writing student, has written a review for Everybody's Reviewing of Common by Nikolai Duffy here.