Ok so I’m a bit late with this but hopefully not too late! I know a lot of writers who can knock out a few thousand words in no time. *cough* nanowrimo *cough* It’s the editing and the finessing that takes time.

Anyway, here’s some info about the Asham Award. If you are female, over 18 and living in the UK why not give it a try. The only thing I don’t like about this is that even though Bloomsbury will be publishing the anthology, you will still have to fork out a £15 entry fee (£10 for concessions) and apart from the prize money, you get no other proceeds from the book.  Although I like the idea of my story appearing in a book with one of Margaret Atwood’s.

First prize: £1,000
Second prize: £500
Third prize: £300
Runners up receive £100 each, and have their stories published in a collection by Bloomsbury

The judges are Di Speirs, an executive producer for BBC Radio 4; David Constantine, novelist and poet and Erica Wagner, literary editor of The Times.

The Award is sponsored by the David Cohen Foundation, the award-winning Sussex bookshop Much Ado Books and Rees Elliott of Lewes

The collection of winning stories will again be published by Bloomsbury and will include specially commissioned stories by Margaret Atwood, Esther Freud, Yiyun Li and Alison Macleod

Visit the Asham website for more details.  Closing date 30t September 2008