This week Costa announced their shortlist of six short stories (authors remain anonymous while voting take splace) for the Costa Short Story Award 2013. They are now up for voting and if you’d like to read them or listen to them & then vote, you will find them HERE:https://www.costa.co.uk/costa-book-awards/costa-short-story-award/
Inevitably it brings back amazing memories for me. I remember my disbelief when I got the e mail telling me I was in the final six. I remember the long wait, the keeping quiet, the sleepless nights to begin with (I never sleep well at the best of times) and then the relief when finally the names were announced and people tweeted and the finalists got to know each other a bit. Then of course the award evening – I felt sick before I got there. I felt sick when I got there – refused all the delicious looking canapes although not the pink champagne – but felt better when I met the judges and Bud who were just wonderful. Then of course there was the announcement itself – some times it still doesn’t quite feel real.. Here’s what I wrote about it at the time
I’m still working away on From Writing With Love, my new book on writing but as the days pass I’m becoming increasingly aware of Christmas and all that needs to be done. So there’s a little less writing in my life and a little more shopping and tree buying etc. I’m attempting to be ready early this year, which is unlike me but I also know that any day now I will be reading short stories and embarking on the judging process for The London Magazine Short Story Comp, which I’m judging with author Stephen May who was shortlisted in last year’s Costa Novel Award. Of course I wouldn’t be doing this if I hadn’t won the Costa. I wouldn’t have a story in Victoria Hislop’s anthology The Story, Love, Loss and the Lives of Women and I wouldn’t have a short story collection Millie and Bird and Tales of Paradise, due out in 2014.
Thank you COSTA and good luck to the this six year’s finalists you’re in for a nail biting time but believe me it’s worth it!!
