And the winner is......

We are very pleased to announce the  winners of the second Greenacre Writers Short Story Competition.

Congratulations to you all.


1st prize: A Perfect World by Veronica Bright

2nd prize: God the Homeless by Simon Farnham

3rd prize: The Art of Being Late by Julie Swan

Runners up (in no particular order)

The Veteran by Elliot Mayhew

Up to the Ankles by Amy Flinders

An Accident Waiting to Happen by Marie Campbell

Many thanks to judge Paolo Hewitt

The Greenacre Writers Short Story Competition Shortlist

Twelve stories from our competition have been short-listed. They are presented in no particular order.

Ejecting Foreign Objects - Joanna Campbell

God the Homeless - Simon Farnham

Picture - Erik Lofroth

An Accident Waiting to Happen - Marie Campbell

The Art of Being Late - Julie Swan

A Perfect World - Veronica Bright

The Phantom Cavalier - Wanda Sellar

Up to the Ankles - Amy Flinders

The Art of Infinite Patience - Joanna Campbell
Watermark - Barbara Leahy

The Deaths of Zlatka Vlachova - Sue Healy

The Veteran - Elliot Mayhew

About our judge: Paolo Hewitt

We were delighted when Paolo agreed to attend the Greenacre Writers Mini Literary Festival in May 2012, as he is a much sought after writer and commentator on British popular culture, focusing on music and fashion. He was recently a major contributor to the BBC documentary series ‘British Style Genius'. At the festival he read from his book on Oasis and from his autobiography, gaining a few new fans in the process. 

Paolo first came to prominence when he joined Melody Maker in 1979 where he stayed for four years before joining the NME. At the same time his first book was published The Jam: A Beat Concerto. In 1990, he left the NME and started writing for Vogue Germany, Fare Musica in Italy and The Sunday Times. 

In 1993 his first novel was published: Heaven's Promise the first of its kind to focus on Britain's Acid House scene. After his third book The Small Faces: The Young Mod's Forgotten Story he was asked to write the major biography on the band Oasis - Getting High: The Adventure of Oasis.

In 1999 he wrote Forever The People - Six Months on the Road with Oasis along with his anthology of Sixties writing The Sharper Word.

In 2007 he had two more books published - The Changing Man, the definitive biography on Paul Weller and The Mumper a novel about seven friends who meet every week in their local pub. When a stranger asks them if they'd like to buy a racehorse, things get interesting. The book is the basis of the recent film 'Outside Bet', starring Bob Hoskins and Jenny Agutter. 

Paolo 's heart-wrenching autobiography The Looked After Kid - My Life in a Children's Home, led to the BBC shooting a 45 minute documentary on Paolo as part of their 'Taking Care' season.

Paolo has had no fewer than three books published this year: The A-Z of Mod; his book on The  Beatles  Love Me Do: 50 Great Beatles Moments, and Bowie: Album By Album. 

The Greenacre Writers Short Story Competition Longlist

Twenty stories from our competition have been long-listed. They are presented in no particular order.

Pride and Joy - Sal Page
Ejecting Foreign Objects - Joanna Campbell
Up or Down? - Dorothy Cox
God the Homeless - Simon Farnham
Picture - Erik Lofroth
Jail Birds - Alice Parrant
The Stars are Screaming - Scott James
An Accident Waiting to Happen - Marie Campbell
Are We There Yet? - Anne Oatley
Birds, Booze and Bikers - Jo Derrick
The Art of Being Late - Julie Swan
A Perfect World - Veronica Bright
Six Bits of Wood - Pam Eaves
The Phantom Cavalier - Wanda Sellar
Up to the Ankles - Amy Flinders
The Art of Infinite Patience - Joanna Campbell
Green Fingers - Deborah Birch
Watermark - Barbara Leahy
The Deaths of Zlatka Vlachova - Sue Healy
The Veteran - Elliot Mayhew

Short Story Competition 2012 Has Closed

Our second short story competition has now closed. Thank you to all those who sent in entries. The variety of themes and writing styles is amazing! Our readers are now busy reading and selecting the long-list and will then decide on the short-list, both of which will be published here, so keep a look out for your story title. The lists will consist of the story titles only until after the final judging, when we will add authors' names.

Good luck!

Last week for competition entries....

The closing date for our short story competition is midnight 31st October 2012, so there are still a few days to polish your entry.  Enter here.

The readers are gearing up to the task of reading and making notes on every entry to produce a longlist, followed by earnest discussions to select the shortlist to be forwarded to our judge Paolo Hewitt.

The longlisted stories will be posted here on the blog, followed by the shortlist, so keep a lookout for the title of your story!

Two weeks to go...

Just two weeks left in which to enter your short story for the second Greenacre Writers Short Story competition. For all the details see  Here

Prize Winning Greenacre Writers Anthology.

We are very pleased to announce that our first anthology was awarded third prize in the National Association of Writing Groups'  Denise Robertson Anthology prize.

Our stories were selected from the winners of our first short story competition and our own members. The top three competition stories win cash prizes, the top six win a year's membership to Greenacre Writers and publication in the anthology.

The second short story competition is under-way and entries are coming in. For your chance to be published in the second volume of our anthology send in your entry now.

For details on purchasing this anthology and how to enter the competition see:

Greenacre Writers Short Story Competition