The Richard Booth Non-Fiction Competition is now closed for entries. Thank you to everyone who submitted their writing, we greatly appreciate all your efforts and look forward to hearing the results in September.

In the mean time we must heartily congratulate our Non-Fiction Judge, Tom Bullough, for a fantastic achievement with his publication “Sarn Helen“, being Longlisted for the prestigious Wainwright Prize 2023 – Writing on Conservation.

A review by Mike Parker writes, “All time is now: in walking the length of Sarn Helen, Wales’ great north-south Roman highway, Tom Bullough meets centurions, saints and climate scientists alike, and has them all help him weave an urgent and powerful narrative of past, present and future. Though often deeply sobering, it is also a joyous voyage of discovery, of Wales itself, of Tom’s place within it, and the nuggets buried deep in its bedrock that might just help point us towards some hope”.

It’s a truly stunning read, “an immersive and evocative non-fictional journey through Wales and a revelatory meditation on the nation’s past, present and future“. Wainwright Prize 2023.

Well Done Tom!

The English Language Poetry Wales Book of the Year 2023

In other news, we must also congratulate a previous Judge of our Poetry Competition. A resounding applause to Paul Henry for winning the English Language Poetry Category at Wales Book of the Year 2023 with his 11th collection, “As If To Sing“.

“The power of song, to sustain the human spirit, resonates through “As if to Sing”. A trapped caver crawls back through songs to the sea; Welsh soldiers pack their hearts into a song on the eve of battle, ‘for safe-keeping’; a child crossing a bridge sings ‘a song with no beginning or end’…

Blurring past and present, a ‘torchsong’ of music and light intensifies in ‘The Boys in the Branches’, a moving sequence to the poet’s sons where three boys scale a tree to manhood, to ‘carve their names on the late sun’. The collection’s closing cadence includes the long poem ‘The Key to Penllain’. Set in the summer of 1969, its apocalyptic dream stages a search for a key which could save the planet. Rich in the musical lyricism admired by readers and fellow poets, As if to Sing is an essential addition to this poet’s compelling body of work.” Seren Books

Many Congratulations Paul!

We always feel so fortunate to have such wonderful writers judging our competitions. Thank you.

Summer Break!

Hay Writers’ Circle now breaks for the month of August and returns in September, pens-poised and imaginations ready. We wish all our followers and wonderful holiday and look forward to a creative Autumn to come.

Happy Writing from HWC! 🙂