Bookplanet: new writing awards

From the good old Guardian:

Opportunities for aspiring writers in the U.K. are coming thick and fast this year. Macmillan caused a stir with its 'Ryanair-style' New Fiction list, the Orange prize winner for first-time women authors was announced, Saga magazine has launched a competition for talented new children's authors aged over 50, and new imprint Transita is seeking women of 45 and over who can write for their peer group.

Now BookTrust has entered the fray, announcing an annual series of national awards, New Writing Ventures, for unpublished writers of fiction, literary non-fiction and poetry. The awards, worth £5000 in each category, are designed to make an impact on the world of books, writers and readers in the coming years.

What sets the New Writing Ventures scheme apart is that they are intended to help nurture emerging talent beyond the award ceremony. In addition to the prize money, the winner and two shortlisted writers in each category will each receive a 'bespoke development plan' provided by Arts Council England, which will include workshops, mentoring and professional advice.

The inaugural selection panels for the prizes feature a wealth of established writing talent. The chair of the fiction panel is Dame Gillian Beer, professor of English literature at Cambridge University and twice Booker judge. She is joined by authors Romesh Gunsekera and Tobias Hill.

For Dame Gillian, the longer-term development of the skill and creativity of new writers is a key feature of the New Ventures project. "This does seem to be a new kind of prize, one which offers the people shortlisted real support in developing their creativity in the year after their win," she said. "This kind of support is quite novel - they will have the opportunity to discuss their work with a more experienced writer if they wish, and the flexibility to decide what kind of support would help them most."

As entries for the fiction prize should not exceed 3000 words, the judges will, says Dame Gillian, be getting only a "bird's eye view" of each writer's talents and so part of the entrants ingenuity needs to be used in what they choose to enter as their selection. "We will be looking for how we, as readers, become engaged in a work, how the writer makes us contribute, how well they seem to be leading us on through the fiction and how the writing itself is innovative," she added.

DJ Taylor, author of acclaimed biographies of Thackeray and Orwell, heads the non-fiction panel. His fellow judges are the author and broadcaster Aminatta Forna and the biographer Kathryn Hughes. Entries in this category should also not exceed 3000 words. The poet laureate, Andrew Motion, will be chairing the poetry selection panel, alongside fellow poets Jacob Polley and Eva Salzman. They will be considering between five and 10 poems from each contender.

The competition is open to work aimed at adults, and writers must not have had a dedicated publication of their work although they may have had it published as part of an anthology or included in a literary magazine.

Interested new writers will need to work swiftly - the deadline for submissions is July 1. Shortlisted authors will be announced in September and the awards will be presented at the New Writing Types conference in Norwich, October 24-28.