Isabel’s winning words

Chichester-based author Isabel Ashdown has won a major award with just the first few words of an unpublished manuscript.

The opening paragraphs of Isabel’s novel, set in the 1980s, won her first prize in a Mail On Sunday novel competition, which was judged by Sir John Mortimer, Michael Ridpath and Fay Weldon.
Entrants were asked to submit up to 150 words from a novel and each entry had to include the word ‘tip’. Isabel used work which she had written whilst studying for a creative writing degree at the University of Chichester.

She has now moved on to the university’s MA programme and hopes to complete her novel early this year. ‘I’ve met some great writers on the MA course, and a few of us have talked about forming a workshop group after the MA is over. I think we’ve all found that the pressure of a regular creative workshop is a great incentive to keep writing!’

Isabel’s prize from the Mail on Sunday was one which most writers would envy. As well as receiving a week-long writing course with Arvon, she was also presented with £400 in book tokens. ‘I thought I’d died and gone to heaven when Fay Weldon handed me a thick envelope full of £5 and £10 book tokens. 

‘I went out that weekend with my husband and two children, and we went wild in Waterstone’s. As well as new books, I bought quite a few books that I’d already read and loved and lost over the years, like Ian McEwan’s The Cement Garden and Iain Banks’ The Wasp Factory.’

Isabel is now working on the final draft of her novel and, after receiving such a positive response to her writing through the competition win, is hoping to find an agent soon. ‘I do enjoy the polishing part of writing, but it requires dedicated stretches of time, which are in short supply when you’re also working and running a family.

‘Luckily, I’ve got a very supportive husband who keeps me well fed and tells me to give myself a day off every now and then. I’ve got workaholic tendencies when it comes to my writing, so I need someone like him around!’