Ellen Wiles is a novelist, multidisciplinary artist and academic. The author of two novels, The Invisible Crowd and The Unexpected, and two non-fiction books, Live Literature and Saffron Shadows, she works as a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of Exeter (part-time) and as a freelance writer and artist. She makes literary audio and visual installations and produces events for a variety of commissions, with a focus on environmental themes, and is currently artist-in-residence at an environmental science centre, exploring water system resilience and nature restoration. She regularly speaks at literary events and on podcasts, and is currently a judge for the Somerset Maugham Prize. She previously worked as a barrister and as a musician, and still moonlights as a jazz flautist.
The Invisible Crowd
Ellen's debut novel is about serendipitous connections and what it's like to navigate the asylum system of a country you've risked everything to get to. It was inspired by my previous work as a barrister, working on immigration and human rights cases.
It follows the story of Yonas, an Eritrean journalist who has arrived in the UK, is narrated by the voices of a wide range of people he meets on his quest for leave to remain, including his barrister, Jude. A Guardian readers' book of the year, it is a popular book club pick, and won a Victor Turner Prize for ethnographic writing.‘I read this last summer, and I still think about it. It tells the tale of a refugee trying to survive in England – and the impact others have on their journey. A book that makes you see the world differently.’
Jacinda Adern, former Prime Minister of New Zealand
'A fierce, big-hearted novel that celebrates the power of compassion and the resilience of the human spirit. It takes a special gift to explore an issue so urgent and so complex in such an emotionally satisfying way. Ellen Wiles has this gift.'Joe Treasure, author of The Book of Air
The Unexpected
Ellen's second novel follows two best friends in their mid-thirties, Robin and Kessie, who find themselves platonically co-parenting a baby, and have to figure out whether this is a viable family.
It's a book about friendship, kinship and motherhood, and explores a web of ideas about different species of love and approaches to family across human and animal cultures; it devles into fertility treatments, co-parent matching services, and post-natal depression; and it considers the way that legal systems have slowly evolved to support more queer and alternative family structures.
New research shows that platonic and non-traditional co-parenting arrangements are growing in popularity, and are resulting in happy children; and yet the idea of two female friends getting together to start a family is still almost unheard-of. This and other themes that emerge from the story have made it a popular book club pick.'Wonderful… all sorts of common assumptions about motherhood and family are turned on their head. It’s brilliant on friendship, identity, longing and resilience’
THE DAILY MAIL
‘A heartwarming depiction of female friendship as a bond stronger than any other'THE TIMES
‘A thought-provoking and unputdownable story about the interconnectedness of female friendship, love, romance and family’MY WEEKLY
‘A novel that comes with a whole different way of thinking – it takes in a rich wide queer world of angelfish and allomothers, and it’s a story of real love between friends’Daisy Hildyard, author of EMERGENCY, RSL Encore Award
‘I loved it! It is intellectually stimulating, full of thought-provoking ideas about family structure and different kinds of love, while the relationships are very affecting. I was really moved. It feels in some ways like a wild, or at least uncommon, story, but is grounded in a realism full of specific detail.’Kate Murray-Browne, author of ONE GIRL BEGAN
‘Loved this clever and funny novel by Ellen Wiles on the complexities of friendship, motherhood and social change.’Anna Mazzola, author of THE BOOK OF SECRETS
‘Wiles writes with humour, tenderness and wisdom; The Unexpected is a welcome portrait of the beauty, the battle and the exhilarating reinvention of contemporary motherhood.’Marianne Levy, author of DON’T FORGET TO SCREAM
'Ellen Wiles shows us how legal forces can shape our most intimate lives. This novel reminds us that chosen families are as complicated, messy and thick with love as biological ones.'Rowan Hisayo Buchanan, author of THE SLEEP WATCHER
‘The Unexpected is moving and witty, smart and indelible on female friendship and chosen families, and the knotty complexities of parenting beyond the tired old structures of straight fams. I loved and admired it so much!’Rosie Dastgir, author of A SMALL FORTUNE
‘I didn't want this novel to end. Through radiant writing, Ellen Wiles offers a brutally honest portrait of motherhood in its joys and despairs, as experienced between two best women friends in the unconventional position of sharing a baby. But this is also a book about the meaning of life in all its layers because its narrators, Kessie and Robin, are both searching, upending our ideas about family in the process. It's about time someone wrote about this! Thank you, Ellen Wiles.’Donna Freitas, author of THE NINE LIVES OF ROSE NAPOLITANO
‘An intelligent, thought-provoking, tender, and very real exploration of friendship, pregnancy, and the changing face of modern parenting.'Susannah Wise, author of OKAY THEN THAT’S GREAT
‘Ellen Wiles's The Unexpected is a story of motherhood, female friendship, alternative families and different kinds of love. Original, thoughtful, stimulating and highly readable.’Vesna Goldsworthy, author of THE IRON CURTAIN
Live Literature
Why have live literature events, like literary festivals and salons, become so popular in the digitalized 21st century? What is their cultural value for audiences and performers? Through experiential literary ethnographies of events such as the Hay Festival, composed by a creative writer to evoke the experience of being there through multiple points of view, this book seeks to answer those questions.
Reviewed as a 'groundbreaking' book on this theme, and packed with practical insights on audience and performer dynamics and tools for evaluation, this book has led to international lectures and speaking events including at the Gothenburg Litteraturhus and the Manchester Museum.
‘A hugely insightful and entertaining survey of the live literature scene: what it is, who it's for, and why it matters. Full of brilliant analysis and fascinating vignettes, it is sure to be standard work on the subject for years to come.’
Michael Hughes, author of Country
Saffron Shadows
This book explores the fascinating storytelling and lives of three generations of Burmese writers living under the world's most repressive censorship regime over five decades. It contains new translations of short stories, poetry, and memoir, and each translation is paired with its author's life story, with characters including U Win Tin who spent 27 years in jail for his words.
'A fascinating exploration of censorship as experienced by nine writers of Myanmar over three generations. Ellen Wiles is to be commended for her deft account of the political and historical backdrop, but most of all for the grace with which she makes room for these authors to reflect on the marks left by censorship in their own words and works.'
Maureeen Freely, President of English PEN and author of The Stork Club
AUDIO & IMMERSIVE
Ellen writes and produce immersive literary audio work and installations, often engaging with changing landscapes and ecology, and exploring our entanglement with more-than-human life through narrative and experiential sound. My work has been commissioned by organisations including The National Trust. I am currently Artist-in-Residence at CREWW, an environmental science centre, working on ‘Storying Water’: an arts-led project exploring the science behind the water system and issues affecting its resilience.
A new work, Springs and Seepages, co-created with Arun Sood and Emma Molony, will be exhibited at the Thelma Hulbert Gallery from 17 January to 26 February 2026. An immersive installation with audio, music, video, and other visual and sculptural elements, it is a response to the unique watery landscape at Otterhead Lakes.
Riverlandia
This immersive fictional sound story of a river valley at a time of ecological change is narrated by its human and non-human inhabitants. We hear from characters including the river itself, a bullhead fish, a dragonfly, an alder tree, sheep, and a skylark.
A starry cast of voice actors includes Gemma Whelan, Mike Wozniak, Spencer Jones, and Bethany Antonia. Commissioned by The National Trust as a creative response to their prize-winning river restoration project in Porlock Vale. Funded by Frugi.
Buzzard View
This literary soundwalk is a long-form audio essay that evokes the experience of walking a stunning loop route around a headland where Exmoor meets the sea. The path passes through woodland, moorland and coast, over a beacon, and past buildings ancient and new telling a tale of how this place has been transformed over time by humans and non-humans. It can be experienced as a virtual immersive walk experience or in situ.
Commissioned by The National Trust, as a creative response to the wide-ranging programme of nature restoration work at the Holnicote Estate. Funded by The Green Recovery Challenge Fund. Written and narrated by Ellen Wiles. Sound recording by Ellie Williams. Sound editing by Nicholas Allan.
Paper Heron
Paper Heron is a fictional sound story set on the banks of the River Exe in 1851. It follows Effie, a girl working in a rag room at a paper mill, and secretly dreaming of making art, when she unexpectedly gets the chance to visit the Great Exhibition in London, where she will encounter new machines, crafts and creative ideas from across the British Empire and beyond. As recounted to Horace, the local grey heron. Commissioned by Double Elephant as part of Paper & Print: a research project funded by the National Heritage Lottery Fund.
The New Riverscapers: A Beaver's Tale
This fictional sound story is narrated by a beaver reintroduced and living freely on a Devon river. It was researched and developed through a collaboration with environmental scientist, Professor Richard Brazier, who has been involved in the research and licensing of beaver reintroductions across the UK.
Commissioned by Literature Works as part of a writing residency.
Pebbled Heights, Mossy Depths
This immersive literary soundwalk is a long-form audio essay that evokes the experience of walking part of the East Devon Way. With narration and a soundscape recorded in situ, it describes walking this beautiful route from Woodbury Castle, an iron age fort, along to Fire Beacon hill, a nature reserve above Sidmouth, exploring the rich and complex ecology and history of the landscape along the way.
The work was commissioned by the East Devon Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and Double Elephant as part of the Routes project funded by Arts Council England. It was developed through collaboration with experts in environmental science and environmental nature and conservation management.Podcasts
Sound Stories podcast
Subscribe and listen to the podcast editions of these literary sound stories and soundwalks
Monocle Meet the Writers podcast
Listen to the episode of Monocle Magazine’s Meet the Writers podcast in which I was Georgina Godwin’s guest
The Hexagon Podcast
Watch/listen to my podcast series, The Hexagon, in which I invite guests to offer their top arts and culture tips under lockdown and beyond
Live Literature Launch
Watch the launch event for my Live Literature book hosted by comedian Mike Wozniak
ARTICLES & STORIES
Ellen writes articles, stories and reviews. You can find some of them here.
‘Small found dogs’
A review of 13 March 1911 by Adam Smyth, TLS, August 2019
‘A Tale of Two LexiconS’
A review of two debut novels both long listed for the Man Booker Prize: Everything Under by Daisy Johnson and In Our Mad and Furious City by Guy Gunaratne, TLS, August 2018
‘Three branches of Literary ANthropology’
Ethnography, March 2018
‘The circus act of writing and mothering’
weheartwriting.com, November 2018
‘Literature, live’
International Literature Showcase, November 2017
‘Tea dial’
A literary essay-diary about my tea drinking habit for Versopolis
‘Whirl and Muddle’
A review of literary essays on war and writing by Samuel Hynes, TLS, May 2018
‘Essays': A review of Reading Life by Chris Arthur
Times Literary Supplement, February 2018
‘Giving birth to a book vs giving birth to a child’
Female First, November 2017
'Ark: immersive short story shows in library spaces'
The Library as Incubator Project, April 2016
Events
Speaking events
Ellen is regularly invited to speak at literary events, on panels, on podcasts and at book clubs. She enjoys giving talks and meeting readers and audiences. She also curates literary events, from panel discussion events to immersive literary performance events and installations in venues such as The British Library.
Performance
Ellen curates and direct literary performance events that bring literature beyond the page to new audiences in creative ways. She writes and produces literary experiences that involve collaborations with sound designers and with artists working across other forms including video, dance, shadow puppetry, and live illustration. Funded by Arts Council England, Ellen founded Ark, an immersive literary performance project, and was subsequently commissioned by organisations including The British Library to create new shows in response to their exhibitions.
Contact me
Book enquiries
Laura Macdougall at United Agents LMacdougall [at] unitedagents.co.uk
ellenwiles [at] gmail.com
Social media
@ellenwiles sporadically on Instagram, Bluesky, and LinkedIn
Subscribe
Very occasionally Ellen will send out a newsletter about books and events. Please subscribe to keep in touch.