Exeter Novel Prize

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Competitions

Huge congratulations to Rebecca Kelly for winning this year’s Exeter Novel Prize with her novel Skin-whistle. Unfortunately, Rebecca was unwell on Saturday and is therefore not in this line-up pic of the prizegiving.

However, ninevoices‘ own talented Sarah is there (in her spotty dress), having been shortlisted for the second time in two years. Many congratulations to Sarah and to all this year’s longlistees and shortlistees.

L to R: Freya Sampson (shortlistee), Cathie Hartigan (CWM), Broo Doherty (DHH Literary Agency) Sophie Duffy (CWM), Kathleen Jowitt, Sarah Dawson, Emma Albrighton, Debbie Fuller-White (all shortlistees)

The Exeter Novel Award

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Briony Collins, Broo Doherty, News

Many congratulations to Briony Collins who yesterday won the Exeter Novel Award with her wonderful-sounding civil rights novel Raise Them Up.  Here she is sitting next to Sarah (front row, second from right).

Our lovely judge was Broo Doherty of DHH Agency. If you’d like to see her thoughts on the six shortlisted novels, go to: http://www.creativewritingmatters.co.uk/2016-enp-award-ceremony-and-judges-report.html

Snakes and Ladders

Last week saw me perched near the top of a ladder, when my novel reached the short list for the Spotlight Adventures in Fiction competition, with a prize of a year’s mentoring, website exposure, and possible introduction to their agent connections. Then, on Wednesday, I was swallowed by a snake when I learned that Kate Swindlehurst had won, with her ‘bold, contemporary novel’, The Station Master. I wish her well, despite turning a bilious shade of green.

Trying to get published can be a game of snakes and ladders. The Gingham Square, which started life as a short story, then morphed into a full-blown book, was long listed in the Flash 500 First Chapter competition, but got no further. It subsequently failed to make any impression whatsoever on the Exeter Novel judges. More recently, came that long listing and subsequent short listing by Adventures in Fiction. And although I didn’t win, their organiser, Marion Urch, sent a generous email letting me know that I came third. Encouraging when you’re beginning to fear your work isn’t quite good enough.

I had requested a critique from the Exeter competition people and their main criticism came back that my opening failed to sufficiently suggest the extremely dark deeds to come. I needed a prologue that redressed this without giving away too much. Back to the drawing board, then.

Fortunately I have ninevoices to keep me from slacking. and a recent session saw my friends gleefully dissecting  my prose and squiggling suggestions all over my latest draft. There was even this helpful sketch (stick with the writing, Sarah!)

I wish I’d had time to enter my improved version into the Lucy Cavendish competition (no news on this until April 4th, but I’m not holding my breath), but I consider that Exeter critique money well spent.

There are plenty of other competitions for new novels over the coming months – Bath, Yeovil, the Bridport, Winchester, Mslexia – so I shall be back at my attempts to scale a few rungs.

But the next snake I see gets a punch ion the mouth.

 

More Good News to Share

At the beginning of the month we shared the wonderful news that Sarah had been shortlisted in the Exeter Novel Competition. A tremendous achievement, and well-deserved, since Sarah is not only talented, but spends long hours making sure her work is always spot-on.

Some of our followers may have picked up that I, too, entered that competition, though I failed to make even the long list. I am proud of the fact that, rather than retreating to my lair with some long dressmakers’ pins and an effigy of Sarah, I ran around my house (almost) whooping with joy. An achievement for one of ninevoices is always an achievement for us all.

Today I have learned that my novel The Gingham Square has been shortlisted in the Spotlight Adventures in Fiction Competition. Great news.

Both of these competitions were featured in our monthly Competitions to Enter posts – so do look out for future opportunities. We have proved that they CAN be grasped.

Check out the competitions

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News

There’s a scene in Chariots of Fire where a disheartened Harold Abrahams declares that if he can’t win he won’t run – to which his girlfriend replies that if he won’t run he can’t win. I don’t have Olympic gold in my sights but without my writing pals’ encouragement I’d never have entered my novel for this year’s Exeter Novel Award. Which means I’d never have received yesterday’s email telling me it had been shortlisted. This is a first for me – so I hope our blog-readers won’t just think ‘smug git’ when they read that! I feel so grateful (as well as amazed) that I want to encourage everyone to listen to the positive voices in their lives – and act on what they hear.  Maggie’s monthly round-up of competitions (below) is a particularly helpful spur for me.

Fear of longlists …

I’ve lost count of the number of writing competitions I’ve entered. With a couple of exceptions I’ve got nowhere. Even though writing is something I love, the number of hours I’ve clocked up, not to mention the so-called opportunity cost, can feel pretty dispiriting without a readership (beyond my wonderful writing group). Which is why I decided I wouldn’t bother checking the latest ‘longlist’. If I was on it, the organisers would let me know. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t have to go through that heartsink scanning-to-no-avail thing. Liberation! On Valentine’s Day I woke up to an email: one of my lovely writing pals thought she recognised my novel on the Exeter Novel longlist but she wasn’t sure; there were no authors’ names. I jumped out of bed and got checking. Feverishly. And …

… she was right!

Whoop! I felt so encouraged I got working on a short story to enter into another competition. But if my friend hadn’t told me, I’d still be in the dark. I was wrong about the organisers being in touch.

So in future I’ll be checking longlists, however much my poor old heart has to sink!