By Felix Bill
If you’d told me a year ago that my first three publications and my first writing grant would be for creative nonfiction, I’d have been baffled. When I started writing, my stories were dyed-in-the-wool speculative. Amid myth retellings and narratives that go bump in the night, I never expected to write anything you could class as ‘contemporary lit’, let alone narrative nonfiction, but here I am.
Creative nonfiction has given me the chance to flex my writing muscles, build a literary network, and really start getting my work out there. Now I have a previous publications list to be proud of and a commission to write a collection of nonfiction short stories for the UK National Parks.
Here’s my three step method:
Step 1: Write Your Passions
This step’s all about playing the odds. Are you the best writer in your local creative writing circle? Maybe, but you’ve got plenty of competition for the crown. On the other hand, you’re (probably) easily the best creative writer in your local cycling group/climbing centre/boxing gym. The odds are definitely much higher. That’s why writing about your least literary hobbies can fast-track you to niche publication opportunities.
We all love our hobbies, that’s why they’re part of our day-to-day lives, and where there’s love, there’s inspiration. Did your hobby lead to a sudden realisation? A life-long friendship? Capture these pivotal moments on the page and you’ll be laughing. Once you’ve got your piece written, go looking for magazines about your interests and hit them with a submission full of your personal authorial flair. The chances are, it will be the best piece of writing in their next issue.
Step 2: Get More Involved
Join organisations that promote or campaign for your interests and you might discover a writing opportunity waiting for you just around the corner. That’s how I found my first writing grant.
This year, Campaign for National Parks is running a ‘New Perspectives’ storytelling scheme to encourage more young people to explore the great outdoors. If I hadn’t been on their website, I never would have found the application form, so get involved. If there are local or national organisations that promote your hobby, join them and see what happens. If you’re signed up to any newsletters, write a piece for them and submit it. You never know who might end up reading your writing once it’s out there!
Step 3: Utilise Your Unique Selling Points
Another great way to increase your chances of nonfiction publishing success is to look for a unique perspective to write from. If you can pitch yourself as the only nonfiction writer combining BLANK and BLANK, editors will get interested.
A great example of this is the book “Math In Drag” By Kyne Santos, a drag queen who teaches her audiences math in a fun, sassy way that makes it easy to remember. Now I’ve not written a piece of book- length nonfiction, but the BLANK and BLANK logic applies to short fiction submissions just as much as it does to full-length works. If you can find the sweet spot that makes your point of view unique, you’ll be published in no time.
Conclusion
Publishing is an opaque and frustrating business, but opportunities for early career writers are out there! All you need to do is find them, so good luck!
Bio: Felix Bill is a transgender author. His first play premiered in March, 2024, and he has had short stories published by Cursed Morsels Press, The Gatliff Trust, and Powders Press. He is a National Parks New Perspectives storytelling grant recipient, and has been accepted onto the 2024/2025 Tom Marshman writing mentorship program in Bristol, England, where he lives.
