Congratulations to Tom Vowler, whose short story collection, The Method and Other Stories, has just been shortlisted for the prestigious Edge Hill Prize.

Ailsa Cox, Reader in Creative Writing and English at Edge Hill University, said: “We’re delighted by the sheer quality and diversity of the shortlist. Some of these names [...]]]>

Congratulations to Tom Vowler, whose short story collection, The Method and Other Stories, has just been shortlisted for the prestigious Edge Hill Prize.

Ailsa Cox, Reader in Creative Writing and English at Edge Hill University, said: “We’re delighted by the sheer quality and diversity of the shortlist. Some of these names are already familiar such as Helen Simpson who has won numerous accolades as one of those rare writers to have built a reputation exclusively on short stories. She is pitted against the likes of rising star Tom Vowler who has only been writing for the last couple of years. I think the list reflects the diversity of the prize and that it is open to anyone whether established or not.”

This year’s prize has three categories – the main literary award of £5,000, the £1,000 Readers’ Prize and the Edge Hill University MA Creative Writing Prize of £500.

The winner will be announced at an award ceremony at the Blackwell Bookshop, Charing Cross Road, on 7^th July.

Patrick Holland Patrick Holland grew up in outback Queensland, Australia, where his first jobs were horse work in Maranoa [...]]]> We are pleased to announce that this year’s Scott Prize winners will be published in October and will be available across the US, Australia and Europe. Meanwhile, here’s a reminder of who the winners are:

Patrick Holland

Patrick Holland grew up in outback Queensland, Australia, where his first jobs were horse work in Maranoa district and the top end. He has travelled widely throughout Asia and has studied language and literature at Qingdao University and Beijing Foreign Studies University on PRC scholarship, as well as Ho Chi Minh Social Sciences University in Vietnam. He currently lives in Brisbane where, on a typewriter that belonged to his mother, he pursues a form of literary minimalism inspired by Arvo Pärt, Ernest Hemingway and Yasunari Kawabata.

His novel The Long Road of the Junkmailer won the Queensland Premier’s Award for Best Emerging Author and his second novel, The Mary Smokes Boys will be published by Transit Lounge Press.

His Salt collection, The Source of the Sound follows the journeys of exiles in search of home. Each story makes a study of light and dark; else noise, sound and silence. It is his first collection.


Susannah Rickards

Susannah Rickards comes from Newcastle on Tyne. She read English at Oxford University then worked in the theatre for ten years and the travel industry for five before turning to writing. Her fiction has been broadcast on BBC radio and featured in anthologies and a variety of literary magazines including The New Writer. She’s won an Eastside Bursary, a Hawthornden Fellowship and The Conan Doyle Award. Her work has been shortlisted and placed in competitions including Fish, Crime Writers’ Association Debut Dagger and Commonwealth Short Story. Her first novel was shortlisted for the Cinnamon Prize last year. She lives near London with her husband and twin sons.


Tom Vowler

Tom Vowler lives on the edge of Dartmoor, in the UK. In 2009 he received an Arts Council grant to research and write a novel, which he blogs about here: http://oldenoughnovel.blogspot.com He started writing short stories on his creative writing MA; things got out of hand, and soon there was a collection. He’s rarely happier than when traipsing across the moor, reading in a good pub, or on the cricket field. He’s rarely unhappier than when in a city, the pub is closed, or the game is rained off. He is the Assistant Editor of the literary journal SHORT Fiction.