Matilda shares her journey to literary success, the impact of the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize, and advice for aspiring writers.
How and when did you get into writing?
I work for magazines and newspapers as an editor and staff writer so I’ve been writing journalistically for more than fifteen years. I I have always been a huge reader and wanted to write myself, but was somewhat straightened by fear and what I perceived as a lack of time. In my mid-twenties I started a novel and shelved it after around 10,000 words. I was working at a national newspaper at the time and spent all day writing lots of words and so coming home and writing more just didn’t feel possible. Then I had my son and I went freelance and writing fiction seemed even less possible. In 2018, on a whim almost, I applied to do the Faber Academy Writing A Novel course. The course was a lot of money and I’d done some very boring corporate copywriting work that year (not my usual choice!), which made it an option for the first time. I had to write a short story as part of my application. It was the first fiction I’d written for almost a decade so I was amazed when I got in. That six-month course taught me so much about the practice of novel writing and helped me forge the daily habit of hitting a wordcount or making sure I checked in with my ideas, even if I didn’t have more than 30 minutes to write. Most importantly, the course gave me a group of fantastic fellow writer friends. It helped me to realise that the 'not having time to write' thing was a story I’d told myself. It made me make time to write, sometimes in the early mornings and sometimes very late at night. It permitted me to make it a priority, to start telling myself I was a writer of fiction, and to not give in to a sense of failure before I had even begun.
How did you hear about the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize and what made you enter?
I have followed the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize for years as I love reading commercial fiction and it has helped to discover several books I love, like Gail Honeyman’s Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine and Sara Collins’ The Confessions of Frannie Langton. I have been writing my novel, Forced Perspective, for almost two years now and I use writing competitions like the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize as deadlines sometimes. I applied partly on a whim (a theme!) but also because the fee to apply is £10, a lot lower than some of the other big fiction competitions with similar deadlines. I had absolutely no expectations and was very, very surprised to make the longlist.
How did you feel when you were selected for the shortlist? How did it feel to win?
Being longlisted alongside fifteen other new writers was a massive confidence boost. For the first time, I found myself announcing on social media that I write fiction and telling all my friends about it. Usually, I keep fairly quiet about my non-journalistic writing unless I know someone very well. So, appearing on the longlist felt like I “came out” as a writer of fiction, and then when I appeared on the shortlist I was completely cock-a-hoop. It was so validating that this thing, this work of fiction that had been only mine for so long, that so few eyeballs had seen, had chimed with the judges and made it out of the massive pile of submissions gave me the impetus I needed to keep going. I already felt like a winner when I turned up at Lucy Cavendish College on Thursday 23rd May and met the organisers and other shortlistees. I was listening to Daisy Goodwin, the chair of judges, describe the five other shortlisted books, which sound so so brilliant (and which I want to read immediately), and had arranged my face to smile and celebrate whoever was announced as the winner, that it took me a good 30 seconds to realise that it was me. I was so astonished that all I could say was “Thank you” and shuffle away with my beautiful new glass book trophy to try not to cry into my boyfriend’s shoulder.
Has being involved with the Fiction Prize helped your writing career?
Absolutely. It’s only been a week but already the prize has helped land me an agent, the fabulous Sarah Hornsley from Peter Fraser & Dunlop, the literary agency which sponsors the prize. I have also had tremendous support from other writers who I met at the prize giving, many of whom were previous short- or longlistees, and who have connected with me since. It has also meant I have been able to celebrate and shout about my fiction writing with my wider network and again admit to novel writing as something that I do. Having had a previous novel that I spent three years writing fail to gain any traction, I had a lot of shame around admitting to wanting to write novels. So, the prize has been a huge boost both in terms of confidence and practical support already.
What advice would you give other aspiring writers about their writing careers and then more specifically about entering the Fiction Prize?
I would say just to remember that it’s a long game. I have been writing professionally for almost two decades but it still took me five years to get good at fiction writing. You need to have stamina and discipline and be able to try and look dispassionately at your work and edit ruthlessly. In most of the prizes I’ve ever entered I have got nowhere, but they are a great opportunity to meet a deadline and try to gauge whether a long-form piece is working or is at the stage where you can start submitting to agents. Before being longlisted in this prize I had been too nervous to submit to agents and wasn’t sure if the novel was ready. The prize has helped me both finish my current draft and get to a stage where I was able to start thinking even more ruthlessly about the next round of amendments. So the main advice is: keep going, and check magazines and websites for the major prizes and use them to motivate yourself, but without expecting to win or relying on these prizes for motivation as they have hundreds (sometimes thousands) of entries, and not being shortlisted or longlisted doesn’t mean you should give up.