Bury Lit Fest
Creative Writing Competition 2024

After an unprecedented number of entries we are delighted to announce the winners and runners-up for this year’s Bury Literature Festival Creative Writing Competition.

This year, we asked for a creative response to the prompt Beyond My Front Door. Emma Shercliffe, literary agent at Laxfield Literary Agency, who judged the entries of the Adults 18+ category said: “I greatly enjoyed judging the prize and reading such a wide variety of responses to the prompt. This fabulous theme was explored both literally and metaphorically by the writers, on themes ranging from illness, caring and grief to joy and celebration. There were some very accomplished pieces, and the poetry entries were particularly strong. Many of the stories made me want to know more about the characters and their motivations, and could be expanded into longer form. There’s clearly a lot of creative writing talent in Bury St Edmunds!”. Such talent meant judging the slew of entries wasn’t an easy task for any of the judges. Emma Shercliffe was joined by National Writer’s Centre CEO Peggy Hughes, who judges the children’s categories and Bury St Edmunds Literature Festival Honorary Patron, author, Nicola Upson who judged the Young People 13-17 Category said: “it wasn’t an easy choice, but these two stood out for me, and I adored the fact that they were so different.

All of the winners and runner’s up received tickets to the festival where they will be presented with goody-bags stuffed full of books and for the adults a few treats kindly donated by Butterworths Coffee, Edmunds Cocktails and Greene King. In addition to this, the winners of the Adult & Young Person’s Categories will win 1-2-1 mentoring sessions with local author Kate Sawyer, and the children’s winners have won a bespoke event for their schools. Award-winning author and illustrator duo Kiran Millwood-Hargrave and Tom de Freston will be visiting Abbot’s Green Academy and King Edwards VI School in the week on the run-up to this year’s Bury St Edmunds Literature Festival to give an inspiring talk about their best selling novels JULIA AND THE SHARK & LEILA AND THE BLUE FOX - books full of adventure with a focus on ecology and mental wellbeing.

The festival is particularly delighted with the number of children who got involved with this year’s competition and the opportunity to connect with local schools to provide this brilliant prize. It is one of the festival committee’s aims to support local educators and promote reading and writing for pleasure with the children of the area. As Peggy Hughes,CEO of the National Writer’s centre and the judge of the children’s categories says: “Our future literary heritage is writing these stories.”

Although the winning school visits are limited to the winners, there are still some tickets available to see Kiran Millwood Hargrave and Tom de Freston talk about JULIA AND THE SHARK and LEILA AND THE BLUE FOX at this year’s festival. Tickets for all children’s events with Catherine Emmett, Kiran Millwood Hargrave, Catherine Emmett & Dominique Valente are PAY WHAT YOU CAN and under 18’s GO FREE to all events - to make sure this opportunity is accessible for all children and their grown-ups.

WINNERS & RUNNERS UP

CHILDREN AGE 5-10

WINNER - Zachary Spriggs Age 10 Abbots Green Primary Academy

RUNNER-UP - Finn Wolfarth Shea Age 6 Castle Newnham School

CHILDREN AGE 11-13

WINNER - Joseph Spriggs Age 12 King Edward VI School

RUNNER-UP - Suzie Francis Age 13 St Benedicts

YOUNG PEOPLE AGE 14-17

Winner - Isadora Edwards Age 15

Runner up - Josephine Bingley Age 17 Thurston Community College Sixth Form

ADULTS 18+

Winner - Beatrix Locke