About
Tanya Pengelly is an award-winning writer based in Warwickshire, England. She holds a PhD in creative writing and the narratology of friendship, with a particular interest in traditional performance storytelling. Her fiction moves fluidly between literary psychological and speculative fiction, often exploring the ways in which external narratives—whether realistic, surreal, or cosmic—shape individual perception and reality. Her work is deeply rooted in landscape, using setting not just as backdrop, but as an active force in the stories we tell ourselves.
In 2024, Tanya won the Robert Day Award for Fiction and the prestigious Rhys Davies Short Story Award for Welsh writers. Her stories have been featured in The Book of Coventry anthology from Comma Press, as well as the literary journals New Letters, Visual Verse, and Here Comes Everyone. She is currently working on her first novel, a stream-of-consciousness exploration of grief and loyalty, following a man’s journey through war-torn parallel worlds to save a friend.
Tanya served as chair of the board for the Beyond the Border International Storytelling Festival until 2023 and currently leads Milverton Writers, an international group of dedicated fiction writers and poets.
Publications
'So Much Forest', New Letters, 2025
Winner of the Robert Day Award for Fiction
A woman takes her dogs for a walk in the rain and, over the course of a single 5,000-word sentence, her thoughts unravel—slipping into memories of childhood, love and loss, and fleeting moments of wonder. Past and present blur as the landscape draws her in, filling her restless mind with the weight of absence and the quiet constancy of trees. So Much Forest is a quiet story about memory, grief, and the way the natural world holds onto us, even when everything else feels like it’s slipping away.
'A Dictionary of Light', The Rhys Davies Short Story Award Anthology, Parthian Books, 2024
Winner of the Rhys Davies Short Story Award
Judge Rebecca F. John: “The Rhys Davies Short Story Competition never fails to attract writers of the highest quality, and this year has proven no exception. Among the stories I was honoured to select for the shortlist are tales which vary from the deeply personal to the pseudo academic, which are told from the human perspective and the elephant, and which are structured both traditionally and experimentally. What made each of these often very different stories stand out was that the themes explored, however obliquely, rang out with an honesty and humanity which is the great writer’s truest gift. I’m excited for them to find their readership. Huge congratulations are due to the writers for the dedication and bravery they have brought to their craft.”
Dr Canning, editor of the anthology: “The stories which feature on the 2024 Rhys Davies Competition shortlist present life in its myriad beautiful, heart wrenching, truthful forms. Here, lives are in transition – between cultures and language, past and present, dreams and reality. Characters, scarred and vulnerable, wander, and wonder. It is an honour to include the work of the twelve finalists in a special anthology dedicated to this Competition – many congratulations to them all.”
'Carriages at Three', The Book of Coventry, Comma Press, 2024
Part of Comma Press’s popular ‘Reading the City’ series, offering a literary guide to one of the UK’s most overlooked but fascinating modern cities. Featuring 10 stories by contemporary and classic 20th-century writers, including award-winning fantasy author Graham Joyce, much-loved BBC screenwriter Andrew Davies (House of Cards, Pride and Prejudice), as well as new, emerging and established writers: Mez Packer, Andrea Mbarushimana, David Court, and many more. With stories ranging from ghost stories set amid the Blitz, through the decline of the motor industry in the 60s, to the modern, multicultural city it is today.
More Publications
'The Light, The Light', short fiction, Visual Verse
'The Halfway Bar', short fiction, Visual Verse
'Little Alsop', short fiction, Visual Verse
'Safe Hands', short fiction, Visual Verse
'Per Aspera Ad Astra', short fiction, Visual Verse
'Lesson 101', short fiction, Here Comes Everyone
'Goddom', short fiction, Visual Verse
'The Reactor', poetry, Visual Verse
'That Leg Follows Me Around the World', poetry, Visual Verse
'The Neimansland', poetry, Visual Verse
'Yellow Mountains in China', short fiction, The University of Birmingham Short Story Anthology
'The Adventures of Alex Puddle, Aged 8', short film script, runner up in New Zealand's 48-Hour Film Competition
'Daddy's Underground', short radio play, BBC Radio 4
Awards
Contact
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