I am thrilled to announce that in March this year I won first place in Farnham Literary Festival’s First Five Pages competition, and received the Paris Prize for Fiction.
It has taken me some time to write this update because 2026 has so far been a crazy year. It’s (already, somehow, impossibly) August, but in the last several months I’ve moved jobs, moved house, and attended the wedding of someone very close to me. In the midst of all of that, I was invited to Farnham Literary Festival in March as a shortlisted writer in their novel-writing prize to hear the results.
I went in not knowing if I had won anything – celebrating the achievement of being shortlisted. I had submitted the first five pages of my perpetual WIP in the hopes that some success in the competition might spur me on to finish the project. When the judges announced that I had won first place, I was honestly shocked. That’s an incredibly cliche thing to say, but I genuinely thought I had sussed out the winner during conversations with other shortlisters. I’m not wining any competitions for my powers of deduction.
This prize means a great deal to me. It means that someone else has confidence in my abilities as a writer. Someone who isn’t my partner or my mum. Even more importantly to me, it means that someone has confidence in my idea, which is the thing I struggle with the most if I’m honest.
So, thank you to the wonderful folk at the Farnham Literary Festival for awarding me the Paris Prize. There are four months left in 2026. Every time I look at my award on the shelf next to me, I remember how I want to spend them.
Please visit farnhamliteraryfestival.co.uk to learn more about this wonderful celebration of writing.
