BBC competition winner
A THURSO writer who has sold over 1000 copies of his self-published novels has been named a winner in a BBC short-story writing competition.
Offshore electrician and author James McVean is a regional winner in the RaW contest – a campaign that aims to help adults across the UK improve their reading and writing skills.
His prize will be a trip to London next month to attend the launch of a book complied of competition winners’ stories and a tour of the BBC studios the following day.
The 38-year-old has already published three fantasy novels – Changelings Book 1: Dragons & Demons; Changelings Book 2: The Book of Raziel; and Gaia’s Sword: A Dragon’s Revenge – using an internet system called POD (print on demand).
And he hopes the recognition he has received through winning the contest will lead to more writing opportunities.
James said: “I am over the moon with my win. This is my first big piece of recognition for my writing and I fully intend to begin to pursue agents and publishers now that I have a bit of credibility behind me.
“I am going to attend this launch party and face the terrifying thought of standing up and reading my short tale aloud.”
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James McVean, a regional winner in the RaW contest, with two of his previous books. |
James based his story around characters that were already given to him from the BBC book Max and Lara’s Travelling Space Circus. In a departure from his usual writing style he had to limit the story’s length – it had to be read aloud in less than two minutes.
His humorous winning tale Pink involves Max and Lara – two orphans who live and perform with a travelling space circus – visiting a small pink planet where they meet an amazingly strong young girl called Tiny.
The story will be included a book featuring stories from other competition winners to be published next month.
James was born in Edinburgh and schooled in Orkney but has lived in Thurso since 1987.