Book Review Competition 2025: Call for Entries!

Recently, our popular review blog, Everybody’s Reviewing, passed half a million readers. To celebrate this milestone, Everybody’s Reviewing and the Centre for New Writing are running a book review competition. 

The competition is open to all undergraduate and postgraduate students in the School of Arts, Media & Communication at the University of Leicester. First prize is £100 in Amazon gift vouchers. There will also be two second prizes of £25 each in vouchers. All entries will be considered for publication on the website. 

All you have to do is write a short book review (200-400 words) of a book you’ve read recently and enjoyed. The review should be positive overall. The book you choose doesn’t have to be new: it can be any work of fiction, creative non-fiction or poetry from any time, by any author. Please include a short (2-line) biography of yourself at the end of the review. 

Please send your entries (no more than one per student) to this email address: everybodysreviewing@gmail.com. You can also use the same email address for any queries you have about the competition. 

The deadline for submissions is 9am on Monday 23 June 2025. 

Poetry Workshop at Leicester University's Botanic Garden with Tim Relf

Enjoy poetry? Fancy spending some time in Leicester University’s Botanic Garden?

The Garden’s Poet in Residence, Tim Relf, will be running a small, half-day workshop on May 20th 2023, suitable for poets of all levels.

It will be opportunity to write, share and discuss poetry. So whether you're a budding novice or an established writer, come along and join poet, novelist and enthusiastic amateur gardener Tim Relf for this friendly session at the venue in Oadby.

You can find more details of the workshop here. 

Tim Relf's poetry has appeared in such titles as The Spectator, Acumen, Bad Lilies, The Rialto, Stand, The Frogmore Papers, Poetry Salzburg, Wild Court, One Hand Clapping, Ink Sweat & Tears, The Friday Poem and The Alchemy Spoon. He was runner up in the Prole Laureate Competition 2022 and the 2021 McLellan Poetry Prize; was longlisted in The Rialto Nature and Place competition 2023; and has had work in various anthologies. He's had three novels published – the most recent by Penguin, which has now been translated into 20 languages. 

You can read an interview with Tim Relf on Everybody's Reviewing here. 

Doing a Part-Time MA in Creative Writing

By Karen Rust

I began my Creative Writing MA at the University of Leicester in October 2018, having applied three months earlier. I knew I’d have to be part time as having two school-age kids at home, a home to run and a husband with a busy job, I couldn’t commit to full-time hours. Turns out that others in the same position felt they could manage full time, and I watched them do it successfully. The decision is very personal and depends on your individual circumstances.

I was lucky enough (?!) to have earned nothing for a good few years whilst off with the kids, so there was no pressure for me to get back on the gravy train; in fact I was pretty set on not boarding the gravy train I’d travelled on pre-kids. Office life? Urrgrh.

For me, studying part-time has been perfect, I’d recommend it wholeheartedly. Here’s why:

Time to adjust 
Coming back to study 25 years after I finished my degree, it took a while to get back into the flow of University basics – the library, IT, Blackboard, where to get the best coffee and cake. You know, the important stuff. As a part-timer, I had the grace of time to ease back into things without the pressure of having two assignments due in mid-January.

Reading
A crucial part of the MA. The more you read, the better you’ll do. Fiction, poetry, non-fiction, craft books and more craft books. Over two years you have a lot more time to read than one, especially when the one year course is so intense. You can continue to read voraciously post-MA, but reading during allows interaction with peers and tutors and these discussions feed into your learning and direction. 

Relationships 
Having a longer time period to get to know tutors and peers allows the relationships to develop further. Also, you meet more people - I’ve met the cohort of full-timers from both my first and second years, plus part-timers who started with me and those who started in my second year. There have also been tutors on project leave whose brains I wouldn’t have been able to pick if I’d been here for just one year.

The Creative Process 
It’s different for everyone, but I like to mull on things. Some things click instantly, but other things take time to come together. At the end of year one of the part-time course, you have a big old gap whilst the full-timers are working on their dissertations, five months in fact from May-September, which provides an opportunity to write, read and engage with your tutor (until term ends in June). Then in year two, you work on the more creative, workshop-based modules and the reading and prep from year one comes into its own. If I’d been full time, I think I’d have ended the year feeling punch drunk and needing time to assimilate all I’d learned.

Profession 
Given my desire to move writing from a hobby to a career, I’ve had time to explore this during the MA process. I used the kudos of being an MA student when speaking to various organisations within the arts sector. I also submitted short pieces of work and gained publications that added to my writing biography.  As I work on my dissertation now, I’m a Lead Writer for Writing East Midlands. I’ve delivered monthly local writing workshops for disadvantaged children and am about to start a new online workshop series for them across Northamptonshire. A personal biography company approached me via my Linkedin profile, and it was the MA reference that interested them. I now write personal biographies for clients, which is great for writing discipline and working to a brief, plus it pays well. I’ve also worked with a local arts organisation to deliver a spoken-word video for the Grow Arts Festival in February and am talking to them about future community-based projects. I don’t think I’d have had the time for this during the full-time course and would have had to wait until I’d finished to start this journey. My dream is still to have a book published, but in reality, most writers don’t make enough to live on from that route alone, so diversification is key. 

I don’t want to put you off the full-time route if that’s what you have in mind. My ‘other-mum’ peer from last year is also delivering online workshops professionally and has an impressive publication and prize-winning writing biography. For me, having access to my tutors and peers, not just online but in person (until recently!) has buffered my transition from passionate hobbyist to thinking writing could be more. I’m ending my MA feeling like a writer and with a writing CV/biography a million miles away from the blank sheet I started with.
Whatever fits in with your life, go for it, but if you can spare two years, I’d recommend the part-time course as offering the perfect balance of learning and time to develop it.
Happy Writing!

About the author
Karen Rust is working on a young adult cli-fi thriller for her MA dissertation. You can find her work at Mooky Chick, Ink Pantry, Ellipsiszine & Yours Magazine. Check out her blog at: https://bloominglateblog.wordpress.com/

How Creative Writing Skills Can Make You a Better Copywriter

By Kristina Adams

What do Allen Ginsberg, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Dorothy L. Sayers have in common? They all worked as copywriters. Many published creative writers have worked in copywriting at some point. Why? Because copywriting and creative writing aren’t all that different.

People often put poetry on a pedestal, assume nonfiction is boring, and believe the only thing worthwhile is novel writing. And oh, how wrong those people are. (And how much fun they’re missing out on!)

I write this as an MA Creative Writing graduate, a content marketer, a novelist, a poet, and of course, a copywriter. If you remember this one thing, you’ll be able to write anything and everything: the execution may change, but the basics never do. Creative Writing is a versatile degree. I like to think of it as a degree in communication, because that’s what it is: it teaches you how to better communicate with those around you, both in written and spoken forms. How can that not help with copywriting?

Let’s take a look at the skills you learn as a creative writer, and how they translate to copywriting.

How to create an emotional connection with your reader

This is the most important part of any writing. You need to be able to create an emotional connection with your reader or they just won’t listen to (or read) what you have to say. When it comes to copywriting, that emotional connection can be the difference between someone buying your product or going to your competitor. 

We make decisions based on our emotions. Your product may technically be the best, but if your reader doesn’t care about you, they’re not going to want to buy from you. It’s the same reason certain politicians get more press coverage than others – it has nothing to do with their policies and everything to do with how much of an emotional reaction they trigger in people. The stronger the emotional reaction, the more attention the news outlet covering them gets, and the more money they’ll make.

Style vs substance

Style is just as important as substance in writing. If people don’t like your writing style, the substance won’t mean anything to them. You want to get the message across, of course. If your copy doesn’t say anything, what’s the point in it existing? Your copy should be clear and concise. There’s no room for purple prose here. If you don’t get to the point and stat, you’ll lose readers.

I like to compare copywriting to writing for children or teenagers. Children’s and YA fiction doesn’t have the space to spend two pages describing the history of a sword (I’m looking at you, George R. R. Martin). It needs to keep moving. If it stops or slows down too much or for too long, readers may well put it down, never to return.

If that happens in the world of business, you can say goodbye to those sales you wanted. If people don’t read what you have to say, they won’t know enough about your product to spend money on it.

How to use literary techniques

People assume that copywriting is bland and boring. But the best copywriting isn’t. It’s shiny and sparkly and it’s memorable. You already know how to make your writing sparkle thanks to your amazing creative writing skills. Now you just need to translate that into copywriting.

You can use techniques like rhyme, iambic pentameter, alliteration and more to make your copy more interesting. Most copywriters don’t use these – or don’t use them effectively – which automatically gives you an advantage. Don’t be afraid to use techniques you’ve been taught for poetry, fiction, or even script writing when crafting copy. These all help to make your writing memorable, meaning that even if someone doesn’t buy today, when they are ready to buy, they’ll remember you.

People’s eyes gloss over when they read lazy copy. It’s no different than when they read anything else. Cliches, overused words or phrases, and bland language all turn your reader off. Colourful language that experiments with punctuation and brings scenarios to life draws readers in and holds their attention. Changing one word can change your conversion rate. Creative copy is that powerful.

The importance of audience

Don’t worry about people not liking your writing style – you want to isolate people. That’s right. I said it.

You shouldn’t write for everyone. You should write for one person. That allows you to get super specific with your writing style, right down to the one shot decaf soya vanilla latte they drink every morning. (Yes, that is my obnoxious coffee order.)

If you try to cater to everyone, you end up being vague. Vagueness is boring. It doesn’t sell, either.

Audience is everything. Your audience dictates what you write about and how you write about it. When your audience changes so, too, should your writing style.

You can tell a story

The most effective copy tells a story. No exceptions.

You know what the most boring copy does? That’s right. Nothing. No story. No colour. No personality.

So, instead of writing something super boring, use those storytelling techniques you’ve been honing. Tell the story of what your reader’s life is like now, then fast forward to what their life could look like if they use your product or service. Describe – in graphic detail – the life they’re missing out on by not using your product. The more specific you get, the better they’ll be able to see themselves living in that scenario, and the more likely they’ll be to give you their money.

The one thing you need to learn

How to sell.

Most writers feel uncomfortable selling. I get it. It’s like wearing a pair of jeans that don’t quite sit right or flatter your figure but you can’t work out why. Turning your creative writing skills into a selling tool is possible, though. All you need is a pair of scissors, a sewing machine, and a little initiative. Those jeans that once felt too tight will sit just right in no time.

Ready to get started?

Then join me on 11 May 2019 at Nottingham Writers’ Studio, where we’ll explore how you can write kickass copy! For further details about this course, see here. 

About the author

Kristina Adams is an author, blogger, and reformed caffeine addict. She’s written five novels poking fun at celebrity culture, one nonfiction book on productivity for writers, and too many blog posts to count. She shares advice for writers over on her blog, The Writer’s Cookbook.