MA Creative Writing prepares to welcome 10th cohort @EdinburghNapier University

This is the calm between the cohorts. We had final tutorials with students from our 2017-18 cohort last week, and they are now venturing out into the wider community of writing and reading. Meanwhile Edinburgh has bid a fond farewell to the world's largest arts festival, giving the city a chance to breath a sigh of relief and collapse on the nearest sofa or bench for a while.

It's been an amazing summer, topped off by the majestic Edinburgh International Book Festival. Best-selling book at the festival this year was Scotland's literary journal Gutter, whose 18th issue came bound with a collection of essays called The Freedom Papers. Two graduates from our MA had work in that mighty tome, Catherine Simpson in Gutter 18 ad Ever Dundas in The Freedom papers.

From left: Robin Spinks, Ever Dundas, and Ali Millar-McMeeken

Ever was a guest speaker at the book festival, debating the intersections of freedom, technology and disability with Robin Spinks of the RNIB. This fascinating event was chaired by another graduate of Edinburgh Napier's Creative Writing MA, Ali Millar-McMeeken [see photo above]. Across town a current MA student, Noelle Harrison, read from her newly published novel The Gravity of Love in a book fringe festival at Blackwell's Bookshop.

With the festival over and temperatures turning toward the autumnal, the programme team are being preparing for the 2018-19 academic year - and our tenth cohort! Hard to believe the Creative Writing MA has been running since 2009, but it's also a joy to see so many graduates being published, winning prizes, and going on to complete PhDs.

The class of 2018-19 is going to be our biggest cohort ever, with close to 20 full-time students, many of them joining us from across the Atlantic. It's always exciting to welcome a new cohort, to see what stories they want to write, the themes they want to explore and the genres they want to challenge. For now, as ever, there is only one thing left to say: onwards!