Louise Austin has been announced as runner up in the WriteMentor Novel-in-Development Award, which is open to both finished and unfinished children’s novels and this year received almost 500 entries. Louise wins a one year membership to WriteMentor’s Hub, a community learning platform for children’s writers.

Judge Chloe Seager, children’s agent at the Madeleine Milburn Literary Agency, said of Louise’s manuscript, The Undead Journals of Alex Abbott: “This is an entertaining concept that has lots of fun with well-loved supernatural creatures… It has a strong voice and genuinely made me laugh out loud.”