Unbarred Press was founded by Will Pendray, a published writer, editor, and facilitator with lived experience of the criminal justice system. The organisation was established to support serious literary work by writers whose lives have been shaped by imprisonment, probation, and wider justice involvement. Not as a therapeutic exercise, but as professional creative practice. Our work is rooted in the belief that literature should reflect the whole of society, not only the parts that are comfortable to read. Unbarred Press exists to widen the canon, not diminish it.

Literature beyond the bars.