Who’s Who?

Speciality: Graphic novels, comics and illustrations

Courtney plans to create to create a comic book about everyday heroes, featuring  themes like bullying, protecting others and self-discovery. She believes that pictures can show the mood and atmosphere of the story rather than using words.

Speciality: Playwrighting

Iona plans to create a full length play and is interested in writing relatable and diverse characters. Favourite topics include love, adversity, time travel, history and crime. Iona is passionate about scriptwriting and loves the limitations in writing for the stage.

Speciality: Short stories

Juan plans on writing short stories that create empathy for the protagonist. He is interested in writing about main characters who are ostracized and left with no allies and enjoys creating stories where the characters have to succeed with no help.

Speciality: Short stories

Niamh likes to write short stories as their concise form allows her to explore limitless possibilities in a fast paced and flexible way. She feels that, ultimately, they help her to both arrive at a better understanding of the world and as a form of escape from it.

Speciality: Short stories and poetry

Rebecca plans to create a short story and tackle her first piece of more than 1,000 words. She is looking forward to receiving guidance from professionals and learning more about different aspects of writing.

Speciality: Novels

Seyedah plans to create a novel which will hopefully make the readers feel incomprehensible emotions and inspire them to question and explore what we know of our mysterious world. She is determined that her work will get people thinking.

Catherine Simpson is a novelist and memoir writer. Her memoir When I Had a Little Sister, about the death by suicide of my sister, was published in 2019 by 4^th Estate and my novel Truestory, inspired by my experiences raising my autistic daughter, was published in 2015 by Sandstone Press.

As a former English teacher, Martin is extremely keen to promote the pursuit of creative ambition, and loves visiting schools all over the country to encourage young writers in their work. He is the author of two novels, The Sacrifice Box and Riverkeep, available now.

Julie’s books for children and young adults have been published around the world, adapted for TV and radio, and shortlisted for major book prizes, with five novels nominated for the Carnegie Prize. Multi award-winner Exodus is an eco-epic trilogy in a future ravaged by the climate crisis.

Lewis is an award-winning playwright and performance maker. His work is rooted in collaboration and storytelling. He is the 2019 IASH Creative Fellow for the University of Edinburgh and the Traverse Theatre. His work is about human beings working together in the same space to make sense of a story, it’s the perfect preparation for mentoring!

Ver is a freelance illustrator and comic artist from Eastern Europe, currently residing and working in Scotland. The Scottish arts and comics community welcomed them with open arms, and has been a source of many friendships and incredible support. It is important to pay such kindness forward, and they are eager to lend a helping hand or watchful eye over any young artist – after all, they are the future of our humble community.