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There are just a couple of weeks left before the deadline for this year's Bridport Prize. Anyone can enter and there are some big money prizes to be won alongwith the chance for your work to be read by a top agent. I have never entered this particular competition as I've always been a bit intimidated by it - so I'd be interested to hear readers' opinions on it. The Bridport Prize International Creative Writing Competition was founded in 1973 and now attracts many thousands of entries from over 80 countries. You can now enter online or via the post using the application form which can be printed off from the website. There are two categories - short stories up to 5,000 words and poems 42 lines maximum both with a top prize of £5,000. Second prize is £1,000 and third £500 with ten supplementary prizes of £50 each and the top 26 stories and poems will be published in the Bridport Prize 2008 anthology. All 26 winners are invited to a Prizegiving Lunch at the Town Hall in Bridport, Dorset. An additional £100 and a perpetual trophy is awarded to the best local (Dorset, UK) winner or runner up. The winning stories and shortlist will be read by London leading agents with a view to representing writers. Helen Simpson will judge the short stories Short stories will be judged by writer Helen Simpson who said: "The short story form is intrinsically witty, adrenalised, quick--not restful. It encourages concision. VSPritchett described, 'How did the story change as I rewrote it, perhaps four or five times, boiling down a hundred pages into twenty or thirty, as I still do? Story writing is exacting work.' I'll be looking for stories which show imaginative pleasure in meeting the demands of the form." The Bridport website explains: "In many cases a win in the Bridport Prize has led to further successes and helped to launch new writers. Kate Atkinson (a short story winner in 1990) said that it was very important, confirming that she had found her "voice". Her short story went on to become the first chapter of her novel, "Behind the Scenes at the Museum", winner of the 1995 Whitbread Book of the Year. She returned to judge the Short Story section in 2001. Other noteworthy names include Helen Dunmore (also a 1990 winner) whose "Spell of Winter" won the Orange Prize for Fiction in 1996; Tobias Hill, a winner in both categories (poetry 1994, short story 1996) and Tess Biddington, a winner in 2000, who made it onto the short list for The Forward Prize and gained an agent for her forthcoming novel, plus many others." The Prize is open to anyone, including non-UK applicants,over 18 years. Entries must be entirely the work of the entrant and must never have been published, self-published, published on any website or broadcast. Closing date is June 30th 2008. Each entry costs £6. More details from www.bridportprize.org.uk

Are you brave enough to face the Query Shark? Have you mastered the art of the query letter? That's the one you write to ask an agent or publisher if they'd consider your masterpiece. In America there are a number of great blogs run by agents or editors that let people send their's in for assessment. Among the ones I regularly check out are those by Nathan Bransford, Editorial Anonymous and Query Shark. They aren't just full of fantastic advice but they're also very entertaining and it's fascinating reading what proposals people have put out there. My favourite is Query Shark and for a while now I've been toying with the idea of sending my query letter to her. I'm fairly happy with the letters I have sent out in the past, and generally they prompt a request for sample chapters, but I know they could be improved. Hopefully she won't rip me to shreds if she opts to post my query! * Query Shark is run by Janet Reid, a literary agent with FinePrint Literary Management based in New York City, who specialises in crime fiction - but looks at all kinds of genres. On her blog she says: "I'll be glad to receive a query letter from you; guidelines to help you decide if I'm looking for what you write are below. There are several posts labelled "query pitfalls" and "annoy me" that may help you avoid some common mistakes when querying." How Query Shark Works You can send a query letter to the Shark. It might get posted and critiqued. It might not. You'll know either way. You can send a revised query letter after the critique. You MUST include the post number for it to be posted and critiqued as well. To send work to the shark: email your query letter to [email protected] You MUST put Query Shark in the subject line to have it be considered for the blog. Not all queries will be critiqued - I'll let you know if mine is. http://queryshark.blogspot.com/ She has another blog too at http://jetreidliterary.blogspot.com/

In response to the question about paints from the other day (on Lilting House), my pal Joann writes:

C's favorite media are Prismacolors and acrylic paints.

Acrylics are water clean-up, mix nicely. She likes them.

She uses Daler-Rowney acrylics from Dick Blick or and they are made in ENGLAND! Not China! Not sure about the lead content. I would think that oils would probably be prone to have heavy metals in them as some of the pigments are from earth minerals. (I don't remember why I know that.) BUT I did see in a Dick Blick catalog some "H2Oils" that are water cleanable. I LOVE oils for myself. The richness, the thickness, the globs. LOL

We love Prismacolors too—the soft creamy feel when you're coloring with them, the gorgeous hues. I bought a huge set almost ten years ago (!) from Timberdoodle, and we are still using those pencils! (I do think I replenished with a smaller set several years later, because the kids had used up their favorite colors. But those pencils really do last a long time.)