Don’t be shy, let us know about your success.
Or tip us off; let us into your secrets.…

Entrants - What are your favourite writing competitions?
Any you would not bother with again?

Judges - what are you looking for in a winning poem?
What do you really not want to see, ever again?

Organisers - what is most maddening with entries that ignore the rules?

Poetry

Deal and Dover poetry competition
1st: Lesley Quayle (Broth Weather)
2nd: Keith Shaw (Little Devils )
3rd: D.H.W. Grubb,M.Ed (Pig Days in Bedfordshire)
Highly Commended
Maria McCarthy; Alison Parkin
Commended
Rosmary Fisher; Katherine Gallagher ; Josephine Howard; Mandy Pannett; Gabriel Griffin

Blue Butterfly
1st: Richard W. Halperin (For Victor Gollancz)
Runners-up
Mary Hodgson; Chris Sparkes; Wendy Webb
Best of the Rest
Hilary Allen; Norman Babbage; Virginia Balchin; Patricia Batstone; Denise Bennet; Norman Bissett; Sheila Garwood; Celia Gentles; Eve Jackson ; Sean Kinsella; Sheila Longman; John Miller; Peggy Poole

Petra Kenney
General Category
1st: Caroline Gill (The Figure at the Phoenix Mine)
2nd: Mario Petrucci (‘S’ is for Snow)
3rd: Daphne Schiller (Mistletoe)
Highly Commended
Pat Borthwick; Pam Galloway; Micheline Maylor
Young Poets
1st: Josh Evans (Looking Back)
2nd: Kelsey Harbord (My Sister’s Favorite Bear)
Comic
Doreen Hinchliffe (All Their Yesterdays)

Nottingham
1st: John W. Clarke (Grey Mullet)
2nd: Janice Fox (Villanelle for Pat)
3rd: Fay Garrison (And So To Bed )
Merit Winners
C.J.Allen, Carl Chamberlain, A.F.Harrold, Wendy Klein, Gillian Knibbs,
Diana Pooley, Daphne Schiller, Michael Swan, Anna Wigley, Michael J. Woods
Runners Up
Norman Bissett, Tom Dowling, David Olsen

Scintilla 12
Short Poems
1st: Chris Preddle (Cattle Console Him)
2nd: Pat Borthwick (In Praise of the Oologist’s Art)
3rd: Susan Wallace (The last station stop)
Commended
Heather Coffey; Kate Foley; Sue MacIntyre; Susan Anne Moore; Robert Seatter
Long poems and Sequences
1st: Myra Schneider (Drought)
2nd: Margaret Wilmot (November Journal)
3rd: Christine McNeill (Martha’s Reverie)
Commended
Heather Coffey; Daphne Glaog; Anne Ryland; Dilys Wood; Lynne Wycherley

Poetry for Children

The Belmont Poetry Prize
1st: Sally Bowles (OKAY): £400
Runners-up (£50 each)
Janeen Brian; James Kirkup; Trevor Parsons; Jill Townsend: £50 each
Commendations
Jessica Barrah; Sarah Bryson; Atar Hadari; Denise Nardone; Emma Purshouse; Rachel Rooney; Payal Talreja; Catriona Tippin
400 entries

Short Stories

Arts Council YouWriteOn Book of the Year Awards 2008
1st: Trilby Kent (Dorset; Smoke Portrait)
2nd: Barbara Galvin (A Penny on the Tracks)
3rd: Patricia J. DeLois (Penguins in Amsterdam)
Children’s fiction award
1st: W.L. Mo (Tiger-Mouse)
2nd: David Wardale (Get Santa)
3rd: David Wardale (The Scream Park)

Frome Festival
1st: Joanne Ford (Solihull; The Power of Purple): £300
2nd: Vee Swindburne (Leighton Buzzard; Marcel’s Last Wave): £100
3rd: Rosemarie Rose (Torfaen, S. Wales; Anosmia – The Pros and Cons): £50
Commended
Sheila Corbishley; Kari Royden; Rachel Ward
Local Winners
1st: Geraldine Munns (Frome; Issy Remembers)
2nd: Kerry Hood (Bristol; Allow Me to Arise You)
Joint 3rd: Stella Goorney (Bath; From a Great Height)
& Magnus Nelson (Bath; Trisha’s Dream City-Break)
4th: Ruth Mallon (Frome; The Dog on the Mantelpiece)
Highly Commended
Veronica Birch; Jason Jackson; Rachel Ward

Poetry & Short Stories

City of Derby
Poetry
1st: Kate Rhodes (Portrait of my Husband as a Light Bulb)
2nd: C.J. Allen (The Other Side of Everything)
3rd: Noel Williams (Another’s Lilac)
Highly Commended
Kathleen Bell; Roger Elkin; David Grubb; Phil Powley; Ron Scowcroft
Stories
1st: Maria Goodin (Nutmeg)
2nd: Joel Willans (Buy Ma Biscuits or Kiss Ma Fish)
Garry Pope (Too Late?)
Highly Commended
Douglas Bruton; Alexandra Fox; Lesley Lodge; Martin Pevsner; Derek Taylor; Richard Walsh

Multi Genre

The New Writer
Short Stories
1st: Louis Malloy (Dillinger)
2nd: Cathy Whitfield (Backwater)
Joint 3rd: Alexandra Fox (Warble and Peach: Home from Home)
+ Elizabeth Janzen (The Farm)
Novella
1st: David Winston Lee (Maxim and Jazz)
Poetry Collection
1st: Alesha Racine (The Maynes)
2nd: Rebecca Goss (Details)
3rd: Anna Woodford (Birdhouse)
Single Poem
1st: Noel Williams (On the Verge of the M40)
2nd: Clare Jay (Trapdoor)
3rd: Ryan Scott (Pink Hat at Place des Vosges)
Essay/Article
1st: Ann Stevens (Snapshots)
2nd: Julia Anderson (Eight Things a Writer will Learn …)
3rd: Anita Loughrey (From Crime Thrillers to YA Books)

Time out: write Up your street
Under 16s
1st:Jemma Leech
2nd: Andrew Boardman
3rd: Ellie Warrow
16 and Over
1st: Elaine Cusack
2nd: Jane Bradley
3rd: Wendy French
Commended
Under 16s
Charlotte Buchan; Harriet Chambers; Conor Crooks; Ashanti Darby; Dorinda Kusi; Nancy Netherwood;
Hayley Simon
16 and Over
Tim Dooley; Linda Jones; Robin Shrubsole; Ben Singleton
1600+ entries

Other

Writers’ & Artists’ Yearbook Blog Competition
James Whitworth: £500