Orion and DHA's Space to Write Project crowns four ‘extremely impressive’ winners 

Kalbinder Dayal, Rachel Dench, Abilasha Ramanan and Camille Boxhill have been named as the four winners of the Space to Write Project.

Launched in March this year, the project set out to discover writers from Black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds “with the potential to write the next bestselling smash-hit novel”.

The project is a collaboration between Orion Fiction, David Higham Associates (DHA), Metro.co.uk and the Arvon Foundation.

It offered writing advice and insights aimed at demystifying the publishing process in a series of four online panel discussions run by prominent industry figures in April and May before submissions opened over the summer.

The judging panel consisted of DHA m.d. Lizzy Kremer, Trapeze editorial director and editor Sareeta Domingo, author Mike Gayle and Natalie Morris, freelance journalist and author of Mixed/Other (Trapeze). 

Morris said of Obeah by Boxhill: “I loved the assured writing and the immediately compelling world created in Obeah. After reading this short extract, I longed to know more about the journey our central character would take, and how the elements of magic would unfurl. The language and imagery were vivid and immersive, dripping with potential."

Kremer described Dench’s Never to be Told as “confident and lively” while Ramanan’s Prophet was “brilliantly original” and “supported by a really assured execution”.

Gayle described Incarnations of an English Subject by Dayal as having “all the ingredients for a gripping historical murder mystery: a dark and murky Victorian London, seances, and spirits, and in the form of Suki we’re introduced to a protagonist about whom I couldn’t wait to find out more”.

As part of the project’s aim to provide time, space and access for exploring creative writing, the winners will be offered either a place on a five-night residential writing course run by the Arvon Foundation or, alternatively, a place on a five-day online Arvon at Home Writing Week course, as well as a two-hour Arvon at Home Masterclass delivered via Zoom.