290+
under-represented writers supported so far
Breakthrough so far
Read all about the opportunities that have already taken place and meet the talented under-represented writers we’ve been working with through our free courses, scholarships and mentoring.
Stories of disability and trauma are so often rendered invisible in our media and literary landscapes. But being mentored to develop my memoir was incredibly supportive and encouraging. Getting a place on this scheme has been transformative, both for my life and my book.
Grace Quantock
Former Breakthrough Mentee
Former Breakthrough Mentee
Breakthrough Class of 2025
In 2025 we supported 97 talented, under-represented writers via our Breakthrough Writers' Programme – funded by Curtis Brown, HW Fisher and individual author-sponsors.
Breakthrough Class of 2024
In 2024 we supported 20 talented, under-represented writers via our Breakthrough Writers' Programme – funded by Curtis Brown, HW Fisher and individual author-sponsors.
Breakthrough Class of 2023
We proudly supported 21 under-represented writers with our Breakthrough Writers' Programme in 2023. Find out more about their works-in-progress and what Breakthrough means to them.
Our objectives
- Our objective is to seek out talented writers, who would not otherwise have joined our creative writing courses and give them the best of our tuition and mentoring, delivered by successful author-tutors, literary agents and publishers. We will draw on our expertise to help writers maximise the potential of their works-in-progress and pitch them with confidence to the book industry.
- Types of opportunities. We run regular specialist writing courses with free places for all students involved, grants to provide free places on short courses and to special events, individualised one-to-one mentoring with published authors as well as sponsored scholarship places for under-represented writers to join our elite six- and three-month selective-entry courses.
- Who are we supporting? We hope to address many barriers to entry faced by different under-represented groups. Each writing opportunity offered has a clear eligibility focus. Some current and past focuses of the programme have included reaching out to writers of colour, disabled writers, LGBTQIA+ writers and writers with low income.
- Free for all the writers taking part. Launched in 2021 – and now in its fifth year – our programme of intensive courses and mentoring for under-represented writers is funded in full by the Curtis Brown Group and Curtis Brown’s literary agents. Many of our scholarships are funded by our valued partners – both individuals and corporate sponsors.
The course was huge for me in a lot of ways. The intensity of it was one of the most useful things; working on my writing and exchanging ideas with other writers for five consecutive days was really rewarding – it improved my work ethic!
Tom Newlands
Former Breakthrough course student
Former Breakthrough course student
Timeline
In January 2021, CBC launched a major, rolling programme of free opportunities for talented under-represented writers, funded by Curtis Brown Group, its agents and valued partners.
In its first five years, the programme provided substantial mentoring, courses, events and scholarships to over 290 writers.
Below are the free opportunities for writers that have taken place since we launched the programme.
2025
- 18 sponsored scholarships, providing fully funded places on our advanced writing courses. These scholarships included places on our flagship Writing Your Novel courses as well as our genre-specific courses including Writing Fantasy and Writing Crime & Thrillers - Advanced.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 4 LGBTQIA+ writers.
- A scholarship place on our online Writing Your Novel – Three Months course in partnership with Creative Future. (Part of their Platinum prize for the Creative Future Writers’ Award.)
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 4 talented disabled writers.
- 70 free tickets for under-represented writers to attend in-person events at our New Writers' Day on Sat 4 Oct. This included awarding 30 writers with free literary agent one-to-one meetings at our Pitch Morning event. 10 one-to-one slots were held on Zoom for writers based outside of London to have their one-to-one with a literary agent remotely.
2024
- 11 sponsored scholarships, providing fully funded places on our selective-entry writing courses. These scholarships included places on our new Writing Fantasy and Writing Short Stories – Advanced courses.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 4 writers of colour.
- A nine-month mentoring package in partnership with Creative Future.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 4 talented disabled writers.
2023
- 11 sponsored scholarships, providing fully funded places on our selective-entry writing courses. These scholarships include places on our Writing YA & Children's fiction and TV Drama courses.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 4 talented Black women writers, in partnership with Black Ballad, which began May 2023.
- A nine-month mentoring package in partnership with Creative Future, which began September 2023.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 4 talented disabled writers, which began November 2023.
- 30 grant places providing writers with low income free places on our new five-week online course: The Literary Agent – with Jonny Geller.
2022
- An intensive two-week online novel-writing course for 8 writers of colour.
- 9 sponsored scholarships, providing fully funded places on our selective-entry writing courses. This includes brand new scholarships for places on our Crime & Thriller, Memoir and TV Drama courses.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 5 writers of low income, which began February 2022 .
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 5 writers who identified as part of the LGBTQIA+ community, which began in July 2022.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 5 talented disabled writers which began November 2022.
- 45 grant places providing writers with low income free places on our new five-week online courses: Writing Fiction with David Nicholls, Writing Fiction with Marian Keyes and Writing Literary Fiction with Tessa Hadley.
2021
- An intensive five-day online novel-writing course for 15 Black writers.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 5 Black writers, which began in March 2021.
- 4 sponsored scholarships, providing fully funded places on our selective-entry writing courses.
- An intensive five-day online novel-writing course for 15 writers with low income.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 5 writers with low income, which began in May 2021.
- A nine-month mentoring programme for 5 talented disabled writers which began October 2021.
Our Current Breakthrough Opportunities
Find out how to apply for the courses, mentoring and scholarships currently on offer to under-represented writers.