ON July 14, 2026 / BY EDITOR SOPHIE NAMBUFU / LEAVE A COMMENT

Every year, The Brunel Writer Prize is awarded to the student with the highest graded article submission for the Creative Careers module on Brunel University’s Creative Writing Programme. Congratulations to this year’s Brunel Writer Prize winner, Tamsyn Down, for her article ‘Carpe Diem, Middle-Aged Mode Activated’. 

Be warned: one minute you’re burning the candle at both ends, the next, you find yourself admiring a colleague’s cardigan pockets and discussing air fryer recipes. If this resonates with you, stop—take drastic action before the double-zipped slippers lure you in. Find something that makes you uncomfortable (not Nigel Farage), then dive out of your comfort zone, because that’s exactly where your magic is hiding.  

Embarking on a Creative Writing degree, as I approach fifty, has been a revelation. I regularly resist the urge to skip back to my car after an enlightening lecture or when savouring the mental uplift as creative minds merge in a workshop. Although it was autumn when I began my Brunel journey, an awakening has jump-charged my life. I transformed into a person whose hand flies up and down to answer questions in seminars, gladly immersing myself in set texts, long into the small hours at home. Shedding my self-consciousness is not so much about discovering new confidence, but a surety of knowing how quickly life passes by, and there’s no time to waste—carpe diem, middle-aged mode activated. 

Grasping this gamble firmly, I’ve set about making the most of every opportunity university life offers, apart from clubbing at ‘The Venue’ (my days of waking up with a furry mouth hugging a kebab are over). If there’s an additional online webinar, a chance to work with the subject librarian, open mic nights or a competition for emerging writers and poets, count me in. To date, this somewhat maniacal, yes, approach has led to my poem being published in an anthology celebrating Benjamin Zephaniah (our late, great, much-missed legendary professor), an invitation to perform this at two university events, a free trip to Belgium representing Brunel, and the writing and directing of a short film as well as risking my sanity for stand-up comedy. Finding myself in front of a packed theatre, eager for entertainment, has been my most elaborate form of self-harm to date. Yet, somehow, despite my stomach churning in resistance, I found myself delivering quirky anecdotes, rising on the swell of laughter beyond the bright stage lights. 

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None of these experiences would be possible without the gentle patience and acceptance I’ve found within Brunel’s Creative Writing community, both students and teachers alike. Without the former, I might’ve self-combusted, reduced to smouldering, scorched slippers, presented with seemingly incomprehensible tasks like retrieving essay chunks, inadvertently deleted when my cat pounced on my laptop, losing my car in the car park, or working out the witchcraft of Wiseflow. No question is too big or too small—I’m never too much, even when my anxiety litters my logical brain. During a recent meeting with my form tutor, my fears surrounding my special project completion wobbled wildly through my voice. Calmly, I was reminded: “Tamsyn, it’s week one.”

Conducting dual lives can be jarring, but becoming a mature student is a game-changer, which I’d highly recommend—unlock your secret second life. Regenerating from an NHS administrator to a student, unglamorously Doctor Who-style in the car, is entirely worth it, even if I’ve developed a risky relationship with caffeine, careening around the M25 at odd times. Creating a world of opportunity with words has led to unimaginable possibilities far exceeding air fryer recipes (although secretly I champion both). Days quickly melt into decades, making time an invaluable commodity. Why sit with a what if, when you can turn what might be into a life driven by your dreams? Free your hands from your cardigan pockets, then sign up for that course! 

Or: Please Remove Your Hands From My EQs    

ON JULY 14, 2026 / BY EDITOR SOPHIE NAMBUFU / LEAVE A COMMENT

Every year, The Brunel Writer Prize is awarded to the student with the highest graded article submission for the Creative Careers module on Brunel University’s Creative Writing programme. Darcy Butler was a runner-up for The Brunel Writer Prize 2026, discussing her experience as a female DJ in her article, ‘Being a Female DJ’.    

When people find out I’m a DJ, there’s always a pause. A gentle buffering symbol appears above their heads. Then come the questions. “What do you play?” Fair. “Do you sing?” Less fair.        

“So… Who taught you?” Sir, I have Google and hubris like literally everyone else.    

Before I’ve even plugged in my USB, the silent audition begins. Not of my music, but of my right to exist near expensive buttons. I must prove that I do understand what an EQ is and that I’m not here to gently stroke the mixer like a nervous horse. Men are rarely quizzed. Women are assessed like faulty appliances. 

Almost immediately, a Booth Guy appears. He leans in way too close, breath seasoned with lager. He points at the mixer. “You know you can bring the mids down a bit?” Yes. I do, actually.

I deliberately haven’t because it sounds better. This confuses him. He touches a fader anyway. I die inside. Somewhere, a kick drum is weeping. 

I once dated another DJ. Because of course I did. Silly me. You’d think that it would be collaborative. Instead, it became competitive in a way I never agreed to. “You only get gigs because you’re a girl,” he said, whilst asking to borrow my USB and my emotional resilience. Hear me now: romance isn’t truly dead, it’s just booked at 1am on a Saturday and insists on controlling my set.    

Promoters are a mixed bag. Some are brilliant. Others behave like booking you includes some kind of backstage DLC. Hands appear on backs, waists, shoulders. None of these hands are attached to people who know what a gain knob does. In retaliation I usually adjust the low ends – red-lining the mixer. FYI: this is naughty, it can destroy the mixer. Passive aggression is best delivered at 128 BPM. 

The messages I get deserve their own genre. One man repeatedly asked me to play at his event. Complimentary. Supportive. Until the sentence: “Come warm up with me in my studio ;). It locks from the inside.” This was pitched as a perk. Like good acoustics. I imagined being sealed into a room of tangled cables whilst he explained that “real DJs don’t use sync” and asked if I’d heard of vinyl, like it was folklore. Then there’s the late-night text from a man you thought was a friend. Always after midnight. Always midweek. “Are you still single? X”  I don’t reply.  

Getting gigs is rarely glamorous. Night buses. Empty platforms. Dragging gear through the dark like some cursed pack mule. Pretending to be on the phone. Perfecting a walk that says, “I am tired, but I will absolutely fight you with a flight case.” You learn which venues feel safe. Which promoters vanish and don’t pay you. Which toilets allow a discreet cry without an echo. And yet, when it works, it really works. When the bass hits so right. When the crowd moves as one sweaty organism. At that moment, everything else gets muted. The comments. The hands. The nonsense. Just sound, doing what it’s meant to do. 

Playing alongside other women feels like instant kinship. We share stories and warnings. Guard drinks. But there’s also the quiet pressure of scarcity. One woman per lineup. Two if the promoter is feeling crazy and really radical. We cheer each other on whilst quietly wondering who’ll get the next slot.

Things I have been mistaken for whilst DJing:    

• The singer    

• Someone’s girlfriend    

• Furniture    

• A random woman who shouldn’t be in the booth (I have been threatened by security to be kicked out of my own set once before)  

We don’t need permission. 

We just need the next track.  

Darcy Butler is a 21-year-old writer, currently in the business of figuring things out, which is proving both inconvenient and quite useful. She writes poetry and prose about life, free will, identity, and the little horrors of being expected to know who you are.

Her work is drawn to the beautiful and the uncomfortable: the rotten fruit in the bowl, the open window, the possibility that everything could have gone differently. She is interested in breaking stereotypes, questioning what has been handed to her, and looking at the world slightly sideways – preferably whilst holding a pen!

Mostly, Darcy writes because she is curious. Also because the mind, left unattended, starts rearranging the furniture.

ON July 14, 2026 / BY EDITOR SOPHIE NAMBUFU / LEAVE A COMMENT

Every year, The Brunel Writer Prize is awarded to the student with the highest graded article submission for the Creative Careers module on Brunel University’s Creative Writing programme. EJ Watson was a runner-up for The Brunel Writer Prize 2026 discussing his experience writing about bereavement in his article, ‘The Time to Try – Writing about Bereavement & Hardship’. 

Out of all the topics ever featured in a story, I find myself gravitating towards interpersonal relationships the most. The bonds people form with each other, whether short-lived or lasting, healthy or harmful, marked or minor, can be depicted in countless ways.

Someone walking into a person’s life is enough to create an entire work of art.

The same can be said about someone disappearing.

Bereavement, unfortunately, is an experience that most will have to live through sooner or later. Though you grow up seeing depictions of the process in stories, or the news, or the people that exist in your life, nothing ever prepares you for when your turn comes. I’ve learned that a few times across my twenty years, through the passing of both family and friends, as well as the limbo each one’s aftermath locked me in. Whilst writing has always been my antidote, my personal playground to unpack whichever feelings I want to explore, there are just some things a pen can’t fix. It took me years to even consider tackling my grief through my work, and though the task drained me of my efforts and tears, I can now say I’m very grateful for it.

In my second-year module ‘Writing The Short Story’, I wrote a piece called Zephyr – a story about two boys, Alistair and Deacon, navigating the passing of their best friend, Zephyr. Whilst I’m not Alistair or Deacon, and our stories aren’t perfect matches, we have experienced the same pain. Mine was the foundation that theirs grew from. Looking back on the process, I’ve never struggled so much in the creation of anything before. Facing the demons of procrastination and plot stagnation is hard enough. Reliving a period of your life where you couldn’t smile without feeling guilty isn’t a whole lot better.

Any writer who’s crafted a story personal to them will likely be able to understand an experience of this sort, even if they haven’t lived through bereavement specifically. The breakdown of a relationship, strained feelings about family who should support you but don’t, entering a new environment without the slightest clue of how to navigate it. All are universal experiences. To create art inspired by hardship requires digging into uncomfortable corners of your mind, to claw at the scabs over memories that still bleed from time to time.

You risk setting off every emotion that’s capable of consuming your life, and that’s difficult.

Very difficult.

I learned a lot writing Zephyr, about myself and my creative process, with there being some lessons that I think are worth sharing. 

1. Your writing doesn’t have to be autobiographical. Exploring your feelings in a scenario that isn’t exactly your own can be a useful way to process them and even gain a new perspective on what you went through.  

2. Wait until you’re ready to write about your chosen topic. That may be immediately, but if it’s not (it wasn’t for me), that’s completely fine. Knowing your limits is key here; your notebook/laptop/scattered sheets of paper will still be there for you when the time is right. 

3. Be kind to yourself. As easy as it is to say, taking care of your wellbeing whilst writing about hardship (and in general) is vital. If you need to take a snack break, go for a walk, or even write something entirely different for a while, do it. You’ve already faced enough pain as it is, you owe it to yourself not to undergo any more that can be avoided. 

Before Zephyr, the idea of writing about bereavement or my grief was daunting and a task I ran from altogether. Having done so now, I sit here with a story and characters that I love, and some closure on the struggles I’ve faced. It helped me. Maybe it could help you. Whether it’s now, in a few months, or a few years, the process will be tough, but it’s worth taking the time to try. 

By Emma Lindsey

If you accept as I do, that ‘being a writer’ is akin to a form of mental illness, whose symptoms include (but aren’t restricted to): inventing places and people, spending such long periods in isolation that, ideally, you are able to draw maps, form relationships and hear their voices –  then the London Book Fair, (LBF), the largest spring book trade and publishing event in the world, offers a mix of immersion therapy and respite from the confines of your own head.

A newbie, I have few expectations of LBF23, beyond imagining that it will offer the chance to meet famous authors,  hunt down hungry agents and publishers,  to whom I can pitch my novel, hand over my synopsis and maybe even get an on-the spot, international publishing deal – or at least secure a date for a meeting.

Day one. Armed with a pass and lanyard, I follow the smart but casually dressed herd from Baron’s Court tube, then enter, blinking into the bright lights, where I quickly feel as if I’ve gained access to a literary banquet. Thousands (25,000 over the three days), have converged, from 135 countries, across Europe (Ukraine is in the spotlight this year); the US, South America, Africa, UAE, China and India.

If you’ve never been to Kensington Olympia – which I hadn’t before – imagine Kings Cross station, but crammed with stalls from not only every component of publishing, but variety of publisher. Lots of purple, blues and reds, along with vast, technicolour hoardings promoting best-selling and soon-to-be, book covers, from just about every genre.

Hungry agents and publishers there are aplenty, albeit safely roped off from the public, and with an extra layer of security thrown in.  From afar, we’re able to look but not touch the inner sanctum, where behind Perspex screens and hunched over laptops, they negotiate rights deals.  From the harried body language and the buzz, big numbers are being crunched.

For once, I’ve been super-organised, put together an itinerary of seminars, and despite the surging hoards, manage to find Making my WiP stand out, then a group of friends, who’ve also noticed how strangely lacking in diversity the event seems to be. Then onto  Keeping up with social media , which I leave early to listen to Author of the Day, Colson Whitehead and then need to refuel with extortionately priced coffee and a thin sandwich. Our group splits up, some to find out How to get a Badass Book Deal, another to chat to TikTok about reaching ‘hard to reach’ readers, and others to Creating a writing community. I do manage to meet a couple of agents and editors at a pop-up networking session, organised by a kind author and inclusivity champion.  Duly I reel off my pitch and am asked to submit my proposal. Feels like a gazillion bees buzzing in my head by the time I get home.

Day two. Today I’ve brought my own snacks and head to Chelsea, for a one-day writer’s summit only to discover it’s not included, will cost £199, so it’s back to Olympia where I catch Leone Ross and Irenosen Okojie in conversation. They’re amazing on making magical realism and speculative fiction; refreshingly honest and upbeat about the rollercoaster ride to publication, the obstacles and ways to get past them. Writing in ferocity (aka ignoring the urge for coffee to get that next sentence down), is Ross’s tip – that and stubbornness in the face of rejection. British black publishing pioneer and now President of PEN, Margaret Busby is in the audience, along with a raft of independent booksellers, publishers, screenwriters and poets, all sharing stories  which show that the  industry is moving, albeit like an oil tanker, very slowly, towards diverse stories. It’s an oasis in the desert which no-one seems keen to leave, but socials are swiftly swapped before the next session starts. Then it’s onto a panel chaired by Dialogue Books’ director, Sharmaine Lovegrove, about celebrating inclusivity and representation in the book and publishing world, with the caveat, “It’s really hard to keep having to explain why our stories matter”.

There is a day three but I can’t take in another thing so give it a miss. Sensory overload aside, (there are no quiet spaces, nor a crèche, interestingly), it’s been fascinating to not only see all the components of the publishing business under one roof and how they fit together, but also to be there and feel part of it. Seeing the major and minor players; who’s talking to whom and about what, is a protein-shake boost to my sense of, ‘being a writer’ and an author.  Now I understand what I’m up against, I have more tools at my disposal, including the most important: hope tempered with ferocity.