Best-selling thriller novelist and author Louise Candlish shares her writing offcuts which include: a deleted chapter from one of her most successful novels, a TV drama that didn't get picked up, the prologue of an abandoned novel, a pitch for a book written before the idea was fully developed, and a couple of stories that reveal her taste for melodrama from a very young age.
CAST: Beth Chalmers, Helen Goldwyn, Emma Clarke and Marcus Hutton
Louise Candlish is an internationally bestselling author known for her contributions to contemporary crime and psychological thriller fiction. Since publishing her first novel in 2004, Candlish has released 18 novels - including The Island Hideaway (originally Prickly Heat), The Double Life of Anna Day, and The Swimming Pool. Her bestseller Our House (2018) won the British Book Awards Crime & Thriller Book of the Year in 2019 and was adapted into a major ITV drama.
Candlish’s 2023 novel The Only Suspect garnered two prestigious awards: the Capital Crime Fingerprint Award for Thriller of the Year and the Ned Kelly Award for International Crime Fiction. Her 2024 novel Our Holiday was recognized as a Sunday Times Top 10 bestseller and was shortlisted for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year.
Her most recent book, A Neighbour’s Guide to Murder, is just published in the UK and will come out in 2026 in the US. Candlish’s work has been acknowledged repeatedly by industry awards, including longlistings for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year and shortlistings for the CWA Dagger in the Library Award.
For more details about the writer, the offcuts and the actors performing them see the episode show notes: offcutsdrawer.com/louise-candlish
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Paul Burke - Advertising Copywriter & Novelist
Advertising copywriter and novelist Paul shares rejected scripts that include a screenplay about a cab-driving priest, a dog that could still become a household name and a romantic reunion for the radio.
Cast: Chris Pavlo, David Lane Pusey, Helen Goldwyn, Christopher Kent, Marcus Hutton
Warning: This episode contains strong language
Paul Burke is a multi‑award‑winning advertising copywriter and producer, widely recognised as one of the UK’s foremost radio creatives. His work has earned him over 30 industry honours, including Cannes Lions and D&AD pencils. He has crafted memorable campaigns for major brands such as Barclaycard, VW, PG Tips, British Gas, and Budweiser, and has frequent experience directing radio commercials.
As a novelist, Paul has published four books: Father Frank, Untorn Tickets, The Man Who Fell in Love with His Wife, and Kiss Like You Mean It. Alongside his fiction, he contributes regularly to publications like The Spectator, The Critic, Campaign and The Daily Mail and also appears frequently as a commentator on advertising, media, and culture for outlets including BBC Radio 4, BBC Five Live, and BBC London.
Alongside his studio work, journalism, and novel-writing, Paul serves as a judge for creative and literary awards, helping to shape the next generation of storytelling talent.
For more details about the writer, the offcuts and the actors performing them see the episode show notes: offcutsdrawer.com/paul-burke/
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Lynn Ferguson - Screenwriter & Storyteller
Writer and storyteller Lynn Ferguson shares a mixed bag of offcuts that include a London love story, a nightmare foxhunt, a ghostly family reunion and a family saga of oil-magnate ducks.
CAST: David Monteath, Nigel Pilkington, Gayanne Potter, Christopher Kent, Beth Chalmers
Warning: This episode contains strong language
Lynn Ferguson is a writer and story coach whose work spans radio, television, theatre, film and live storytelling. She began her career writing for BBC Scotland’s Megamag, and went on to create the Radio 4 sitcom Millport. Her radio work includes dramas, fairy tales and comedy monologues, while for TV she wrote for The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson and developed pilots for BBC Two and Channel 4.
She was also a script consultant on Pixar’s movie Brave. She played a main character in Aardman Animations' hit film Chicken Run and its sequel Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget, which she was a writer on too.
Her stage plays have been a regular presence at the Edinburgh Fringe, where she’s had eight works produced, including Heart and Sole, Careful, and The Weir Sisters. She won a Fringe First Award and the Stage Award for Acting Excellence. Now based in Los Angeles, Ferguson also writes short films and non-fiction, with bylines in The Scotsman, The Stage, and Time Out.
For more details about the writer, the offcuts and the actors performing them see the episode show notes: offcutsdrawer.com/lynn-ferguson/
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Ian Martin - Screenwriter
"Swearing consultant", screenwriter and producer Ian Martin shares a combination of film scripts and short stories that include tales of gory ghosts, a mosquito-ridden dystopia, and body-swapping in the Bible.
Cast: Beth Chalmers, Keith Wickham, Kenny Blyth, Christopher Kent, Emma Clarke and Nigel Pilkington
This episode contains very STRONG LANGUAGE
Ian Martin is a BAFTA- and EMMY-winning comedy writer best known for his scathing political satire on The Thick of It, where he served as the show’s “swearing consultant” and for his work on HBO’s Veep. A longtime collaborator with Armando Iannucci, his credits also include Time Trumpet, The Death of Stalin, and many articles and books, including his parody of Boris Johnson's memoir Unleashed called Unhinged. Martin is celebrated for his razor-sharp dialogue and darkly comic take on modern politics.
For more details about the writer, the offcuts and the actors performing them see the episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/ian-martin/
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Lisa Jewell - Novelist
Best-selling thriller writer Lisa ("Then She Was Gone", "The Family Upstairs", "Watching You") shares clips that didn't make it into her books, and talks in fascinating detail about her unusually practical and no-nonsense writing technique.
Clips performed by: Beth Chalmers, Christopher Kent and Rachel Atkins.
Lisa Jewell is the Number 1 New York Times bestselling author of nineteen novels (shortly to be 20), including The Girls and The House We Grew Up In, as well as Invisible Girl and I Found You. Her first novel Ralph's Party, a book whose genre she describes as "flatmates and curry" was the highest selling debut novel of the year. She has written various other genres of fiction, and most recently she's topped the best-selling charts with her psychological thrillers.
So far her novels have sold over 5 million copies internationally, and her work has been translated into twenty-nine languages.
Episode show notes and more details: offcutsdrawer.com/lisa-jewell
About The Offcuts Drawer - Successful Writers Share Their Best Worst Ideas
Writing Tips, Truths & Lessons Learned, From Top Writers’ Greatest Failures
Novelists, screenwriters, authors, playwrights, journalists, writer-performers, columnists, poets…
Every writer has a virtual bottom drawer where they keep the bits of writing they never finished, had rejected or can’t quite find a home for – the unfinished novel, the cut scene, the rejected script, sometimes even the childhood essay…
In each episode of The Offcuts Drawer actors perform these pieces and the writer talks to host Laura Shavin about the story behind them, sharing the often surprising twists and turns of their career that led them to where they are today.
More details about the writers, the offcuts and the actors performing them plus full episode transcripts at
offcutsdrawer.com
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