Writing Award 2022

Intergenerational members of the Finch family love one another. But their world is tough. Too often, their experiences fall short. Rape. Addiction. Abuse. They buckle and fall prey to sabotaging each other’s happiness. Yet their will to do good is strong. When the time comes, they sacrifice hard.

Upon returning home after a long Christmas night, Santa decides his red and white suit is too old, torn and tattered, and behind the times, but with the help of a bit of Christmas Magic, he makes a discovery about “the real me.”

Julia's daughters have left home and she is at last free to pursue her dream of becoming an architect. When she discovers she’s six months pregnant she conceals the birth and abandons her son. The secret corrodes her marriage and threatens to destroy her family.

A young girl and her ghostly friend team up to solve a murder case: she is logical, sensible, and alive; he is impulsive, irreverent and dead.

In 1919 Manchester, a detective must overcome his habitual deference to authority if he is to prevent a scientific notebook and the atomic secrets it contains from falling into the hands of Germany just at the time a young Adolf Hitler is plotting his rise to power.

Citizens take turns “sleeping” for months at a time to preserve dwindling resources in a world ravaged by climate change, but when Piper and Avery find out about the government’s plan to make this sleep permanent, they must set aside their differences and work together to save millions of lives.

The Goldweaver tells the story of a young woman seeking a cure for an affliction, not realising she possesses a power to open portals to mysterious places, who becomes embroiled in the political pageantry that grips her country in its search for a new leader.

Africa 1960's. An Aristocrat has a mine. He turns his manor-house into a school teaching the law of attraction. Dill and Lucky and Dr Jones become friends. They must get an education and save the world. Monks tell them, find true cross before the forces of evil do!

1959: Fourteen-year-old caddie, Izzy, and US Army veteran, Pat, are bound by their disfigurements and secrets they unearth at their golf course. 2013: After a life pursuing Pat’s counsel to succeed despite obstacles, Izzy’s questions about his roots and the cues for his life quest are answered.

As Lana struggles with survivorship and Alam mismanages his past and workload, unexpected love breathes new life into their dreams until the wake of Lana's illness threatens to break them for good.

An angel prince recruits a demon thug from the capital's ghetto as a personal bodyguard, and while the nobility calls this the typical spoiled, scandalous indulgence of the royal family, they secretly work together to remove the King of Heaven from the throne and change the world order.

What if circumstances in Elvis Presley's young life before he was famous had been different? What if Elvis had turned down Col. Tom Parker's offer to manage his career? Would Elvis still be a worldwide phenomenon or just another nameless face in the crowd? What if...

The wine blessed at the Last Supper with the divine power to cure any illness was secretly used for almost 2,000 years and then lost… until now. To save humanity, the world’s top wine expert, with an uncanny ability to smell truth or lies, must use the most powerful weapon of all: her nose.

The Black Tulip: A time slip who-done-it which dives deep into the dirty politics, power struggles and ambition of those who seek to create a New Scotland. How far will principled Elizabeth Armstrong go to win the prize of an independent Scotland? [House of Cards meets Lady of Hay]

In Dark Age Northumbria AD700, a young man alienated from his father throws himself overboard to escape from a marauding ship, then is washed ashore and found by a hermit. Can he learn forgiveness, discover his destiny and fulfil it? Only with help from a cast of memorable characters.

Two smugglers, two pirates, two highborns. A dangerous expedition that will change their lives. Unless their secrets tear them apart. Game of Thrones meets Murder on the Orient Express.

The Author's 'innocent abroad' record of a journey made to Ukraine and Crimea in 2009, to deliver a lecture , with tales of people and loos he encountered in happier times.

A story of passion and fury. It tells a tale of feuding families of powerful beings, lovers found dead in each other’s arms through mysterious means, two emissaries sent to investigate, evil afoot, family secrets, and enemies turned lovers. What else could possibly go wrong?

As Old America emerges out of the ashes of the Second Civil War, John Goodman III loses all he loves to a corrupt prison system. With nothing left to lose, his mind is fixed on destroying his family's killer, yet an unlikely friend invites him to a greater purpose.

New college graduate, Devon DeWitt, is finally fulfilling his dream of purchasing a hat for his new career in the city. He knows the design he wants, yet a sinister customer confuses his mind with too many choices.