A Storyteller’s Journey with Arvon at Home

Arvon spoke with Miranda Moore, the winner of the inaugural Search for a Storyteller competition run by DFB and Arvon. As part of the prize, Miranda joined an Arvon at Home Online Writing Week. With her debut novel, A Beautiful, Terrible Thing, on its way to publication, the course provided space to explore her second book, try new techniques, and reconnect with the creative process. In this interview, Miranda reflects on what it meant to win the competition, how Arvon at Home shaped her writing practice, and why creative breakthroughs sometimes arrive after a hot bath and a walk in the woods.

For Miranda, the moment she learned she’d won was unforgettable: 

It felt tremendous! When the email popped into my inbox, I steeled myself a moment. When I read the words, ‘I am delighted to be writing to tell you…’ and my eyes landed on the word ‘WINNER’, I screeched and threw my arms in the air. It’s a rather hackneyed image of someone hearing exciting news, I’m afraid, but maybe my automatic mind is less original and more reptilian than she likes to think she is.

Winning wasn’t just a joyful surprise; it was a turning point in her writing journey.

As for shaping my writing journey, it has taken me from unpublished to published novelist, which feels pretty pivotal to me! Traditional publication with a publisher I admire and respect has been my objective for aeons, so I am extremely grateful to have landed in DFB’s warm and expert hands. The editorial process has been really enjoyable – I relish that whole side of it – and the various elements of production and promotion have been an education. Who knows in what ways this will contribute to shaping my writing journey into the future, but it has certainly opened the door to further opportunities.

As part of the prize, Miranda joined an Arvon at Home Online Writing Week, a course that promised energy, experimentation, and new techniques to try out.

The Arvon course was titled ‘Discover the writer within’. I really liked the sound of that. The course description talked about exploring having faith in ourselves as writers, trusting creative instincts, being open to experimentation, and about it being lively and energising, all of which sounded right up my street. I’m always keen to dig and delve to work out who I am as a writer, and see what else is lurking there, waiting to be unearthed. I’ll resist a cliché about gold or treasure, but who knows when you’ll excavate something useful. I was hoping to inject a bit of vigour into a piece of work that had been festering for way too long, so the sound of experimentation and liveliness sounded like just the level of freshness and vitality I was needing. The course also promised exercises and techniques, and I’m always up for trying new techniques.

Her debut novel, A Beautiful, Terrible Thing, had just wrapped edits, so Miranda used the course to focus on her second novel, Wild Child. The structure, exercises, and one-to-one tutorial made a lasting impact:

The main benefit for me has been unblocking a block. I was stuck with my WIP and wasn’t sure how to progress with it, which boiled down to what to focus on. One of my one-to-one tutorials (included as part of the week) helped me to see what I need to do with it. It was only 25 minutes, but I really feel that being asked a few questions and probed about my story – and thinking about what matters, what I want to explore and what, ultimately, I’m trying to say – helped to clarify it for me.

Miranda also reflects on how Arvon’s methods help her stay grounded in her writing goals:

I kept notes of all the exercises and plan to revisit the ones I found most useful, applying them to aspects of my WIP and likely future works, too. It’s a lot of content to digest in a handful of days, so for me, the longer-term value will be applying some of the wisdom shared and learned to future projects. Reading back through the notes I took during the week, I’m reminded how some of the questions prompted me to ponder what I really want to write about, and how I see my ideal writing day, so I definitely plan to reread this every so often to remind myself of the importance of listening to our own authentic wishes as writers. If that sounds pompous or pretentious, I simply mean that I wrote down that my ideal writing day would involve a nice hot bath, a walk in the woods and a beautiful bright cottage somewhere with a couple of writing friends! OK, so not all of that’s realistic, but Arvon – via the tutors – has helped me to see that it’s important to listen to that and try to see how much of that I can bring into my writing life. (A hot bath? Why not! It’s where all my best thinking happens and plot problems resolve.)

Arvon has also helped me to remember what I ultimately wish to write: something beautiful that speaks of human kindness and compassion and hope. Something, too, that shines a light on some small element of this whole malarkey of what it is to be human.

So, would she recommend Arvon at Home?

Of course! Challenging yourself in a group of fellow writers, interrogating your writing and trying new exercises and ideas is almost invariably a constructive experience. You never know when an exercise might spark a new scene or character, or when an idea might take seed. The harvest often comes later, when those seeds take root. Thank you.

About A Beautiful, Terrible Thing:

Cara’s world broke when her younger brother, Si, died in a car crash. Three months later, she’s trying to find her way back, when she meets Nathan. Gorgeous, smart and kind, she feels a freedom when she’s with him. But he’s hiding a huge secret. His world broke three months ago too – when he ran a red light and killed a boy. There’s no way Cara and Nathan can be together. But they find it impossible to be apart. This is a stunningly written, thought-provoking drama about loss, atonement, and love which defines a lifetime.

Author biography:

Miranda Moore writes fiction and non-fiction and works as a freelance editor and writing coach. She won DFB and Arvon’s Search for a Storyteller 2024 and the Wells Festival of Literature Book for Children Competition 2023. She is also a Royal Literary Fund Fellow, helping students with their writing. She sings in a covers band and loves wild places, good company and beautiful food. She lives with her family in the Scottish Borders. A Beautiful, Terrible Thing is her first novel.