Bad Fiction

A stylish, seductive new novel from Rebecca Sarah Ley, winner of a Betty Trask Prize and the Guardian's Not the Booker Prize

Sofie Muller can make you into a better writer.

That's why Alice and Walt are desperate to be in her creative writing class. She can spot talent and apply pressure, hone you – if you’re good enough, if you want it enough – into something more elegant, original, daring.

Alice wants it. She wants Sofie's hand guiding hers to greatness, then the book deal, then the prizes and the plaudits.

Still, there is gossip. Sofie will kill your darlings. Sofie will drive you too hard. Sofie’s boundary-pushing is not just professional, it is personal. By the time Alice realises the rumours may be true, is it too late to wriggle free? And if not, is it worth it to get what she always dreamed of?

BAD FICTION is a timely, brilliant novel about fame and mentorship, betrayal and submission, from one of Britain’s brightest young writers.

Review

'I loved it: a bleakly funny, off-kilter examination of the dynamics of power and attraction. I raced through it' Rebecca Wait, author of I'm Sorry You Feel That Way

‘Rebecca Sarah Ley has nailed the creative writing workshop and how quickly a good story can turn addictively toxic. Beware the advice you receive, beware writing about what you know. Darker truths always lie behind imagined worlds' Professor Henry Sutton, Director Creative Writing MA Prose Fiction, UEA

About the Author

Rebecca Sarah Ley writes essays and fiction. Her first novel, Sweet Fruit, Sour Land (published under the name Rebecca Ley) won a Betty Trask Award and the Guardian's Not the Booker Prize. Her essays have been published in Water Journal and shortlisted for the Fitzcarraldo Essay Prize. Rebecca lives in North East London.