Oliver Tobias Bugg, with his manuscript-in-progress, Land of Water, is a 2025 New Voices writer.

About Land of Water: Against his better judgement, Murdoch, a disillusioned sailor, agrees to take a young and spirited team of climbers out to Baffin Island, where a land of towering granite and midnight sun awaits. It is here that Murdoch is given a new lease of life, one that tests his resilience and courage, rekindling his love for the sea and forcing him to come to terms with his past. 

Land of Water is a literary novel about polar exploration, climate change, friendship, sailing and the sea, but more than that, it is about the lengths to which people will go to find meaning in their lives.

About Oliver: Oliver is a British writer and gardener whose long-standing interest in ecology, conservationism and climbing are central to his novel. He was recently awarded an HW Fisher Scholarship with Curtis Brown Creative and holds a master’s degree in Creative Writing from the University of Westminster, where he is studying for a PhD. His research explores sublimity, transculturation and stewardship in the modern environmental novel.