Our Team and Board

Shirley Ahura (she/her) is a writer, author, culture researcher and creative storyteller. A journalist by night, she documents diaspora culture from across the Black Atlantic. Covering everything from music and migration to postcolonial and pop culture, her words have been featured in British Vogue, Huck, Mixmag, Skin Deep and The Face; and published in the following collections: Destination Dancefloor: A Global Atlas of Dance Music and Club Culture From London to Tokyo, Chicago to Berlin and Beyond (2022), What the Water Gave Us (2023) and Anthology (2025). Her work has taken her from London to Lagos, Nigeria; Kampala, Uganda via Kingston, Jamaica and beyond — with footprints as a strategist, copywriter, choreographer and creative director informing her world-building every step of the way.

Courtney Conrad is a Jamaican poet. Her debut pamphlet I Am Evidence is published by Bloodaxe Books. She is a winner of the Eric Gregory Award, Michael Marks Award, Bridport Prize Young Writers Award and Mslexia Women’s Pamphlet Prize. Shortlisted for The White Review Poet’s Prize, the Manchester Poetry Prize, the Oxford Brookes International Poetry Competition, the Aesthetica Creative Writing Award’s Poetry Prize, the Bridport Poetry Prize, Derby Poetry Festival Poetry Prize and the Poetry Wales Pamphlet competition. She is currently a Cave Canem fellow and an alumna of The London Library Emerging Writers Programme, Malika’s Poetry Kitchen, Barbican Young Poets, Obsidian Foundation Fellow, Griots Well Collective, Poet in the City Producers Programme, Out-Spoken Press Emerging Poets Development Scheme and Roundhouse Poetry Collective.

Fisola Kelly-Akinnuoye (she/her) is a writer-producer and facilitator working across theatre and literary spaces. She has worked with The Old Vic Theatre, China Plate, The Almeida, Gate Theatre and the Jericho Prize. She co-founded Wordstew Magazine – a literary publication and collective that platforms and nurtures black writers. Her aim is to co-create communities that nurture sustainable productions of creativity in all formats and champion storytelling from diverse voices.

Ruth Harrison HRSL, Director at London Writers Centre since 2015, has worked in the not for profit literature sector for over 30 years. Passionate about widening people’s engagement with literature and supporting writing talent, she is responsible for leading the charity artistically and strategically to make a difference to writers and communities in London.

Tom MacAndrew is a freelance producer specialising in poetry, spoken word and live literature. He has delivered work for clients including BBC, the British Library, British Museum, CLPE, Forward Arts Foundation and World Book Day. His work spans education programmes, podcast series, commissions, publications, and touring live shows nationally and internationally with poets including Joelle Taylor, Joshua Idehen and John Hegley. He is the producer of Out-Spoken, London’s largest regular poetry night, and in partnership with London Writers Centre he runs Deptford Literature Festival. Tom is a trustee of the Roald Dahl Museum and Story Centre.

Bobby Nayyar is a programme manager and writer. He started his career in publishing at Faber and Faber, Little, Brown Book Group and founded his own imprint, Limehouse Books. He has also managed Equality in Publishing and Wasafiri Magazine’s digital presence. At London Writers Centre he works on the London Writers Awards, Wellcome Collection Non-Fiction Awards, Early Career Bursaries for London’s Writers, Lewisham Writes and regular programme of workshops and events. He has written two novels and a collection of poetry.

Aimée Felone is Managing Director of Knights Of, winner of Children’s Publisher of the Year at the British Book Awards 2022. She founded and runs the multi award-winning inclusive publisher, and is focused on bringing underrepresented voices to the forefront of commercial children’s publishing. With a team led by women of colour, and an unwavering focus on their intended readership for each book, Knights Of works to engage with gatekeepers across the industry, including booksellers, teachers and librarians, and supports non-traditional community spaces with events, outreach, marketing and partnerships.

Gita Ralleigh is a poet, writer and NHS doctor born to Indian immigrant parents in London. She has been published by Wasafiri, Bellevue Literary Review, Magma Poetry,Under The Radar and The Rialto among others. She teaches creative writing to science undergraduates at Imperial College and has an MA in Creative Writing and an MSc in Medical Humanities. Her debut poetry collection A Terrible Thing was published by Bad Betty Press in 2020 and her pamphlet Siren is forthcoming in 2022 from Broken Sleep Books. She is a member of the Kinara poetry collective.

Simon Richardson is an arts journalist and radio producer with a specialism in books. He makes radio and podcasts at the BBC and is passionate about promoting the work of queer authors, many of whom he’s commissioned to write for Radios 3 and 4. He was a Trustee of New Writing South for eight years, helping to found the Coast is Queer Festival of LGBTQ+ literature. In 2019 he was named a Bookseller ‘Rising Star’.

April Yee’s poetry, fiction, and nonfiction have won or been listed for The Best American Essays, Ivan Juritz Prize, Fitzcarraldo Essay Prize, Manchester Poetry Prize, and Deborah Rogers Foundation Writers Award. A Harvard alumna and former journalist, she reported in more than a dozen countries before moving to London, where she has served as a Refugee Journalism Project mentor and The Georgia Review’s editor-in-residence. Her work has been supported by the National Book Critics Circle, Ledbury Poetry Critics, the Southbank Centre, and the University of East Anglia, where she is a Malcolm Bradbury Memorial Scholar.