Winners
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Judges Nicholas Royle and Sarah Hall (far left and far right) with finalists (L-R) Alex Mills (standing in for sister Jennifer), Toby Litt, Peter Deadman, Michael E. Halmshaw, Vicki Jarrett and Alison Moore |
The 41-year-old scooped the £10,000 prize, awarded by The Manchester Writing School at MMU, at a ceremony at Manchester Town Hall on Friday 23rd October
The competition attracted more than 1,700 entries from over 40 countries, and was judged anonymously by writers Nicholas Royle, Sarah Hall and M. John Harrison. On announcing the winner, Hall said: “Judging the competition has been very hard work but enormous fun and enormously inspiring. The short story is one of the most exacting forms of writing and the stories on the short-list are all wonderful examples of this form. The judges’ decision was very difficult.”
Michael E. Halmshaw from Leeds, who is writing his first novel, won the Jeffrey Wainwright Manchester Young Writer of the Year Award, and will take either £1,000 or a bursary for study at MMU.
The winners read from their stories, along with the other short-listed finalists, at a special gala event held as part of the 2009 Manchester Literature festival.
Toby Litt is the author of ten novels, including Adventures in Capitalism, Beatniks, Corpsing, Deadkidsongs, Exhibitionism, Finding Myself, Ghost Story, I play the drums in a band called okay, Journey into Space and the forthcoming King Death. He is a Granta Best of Young British Novelist.
Accepting the Prize, Litt said: "I’ve been nominated numerous times before but this is the first thing I’ve ever won since school, where there was a contest for the paper aeroplane that flew the furthest. You’ve broken my duck, and I’m delighted.”
James Draper – who organises the competition and co-hosted the gala ceremony – confirmed that the 2010 Manchester Writing Competition will be for poetry, with the Writing School’s Simon Armitage as Head Judge.
