We are excited to announce the results of our 2025 Frances Copping Memorial Prize for Fiction Competition, named in fond remembrance of our Lifetime President who sadly passed away in 2020.

This popular competition again received a good number of entries from both inside and outside Hay Writers’ Circle and we very much welcome external interest in all our writing competitions.

We were honoured that our judge this year was Welsh writer, Adele Evershed. Apart from several published books and Adele is one of the editors for a new lit mag, Thin Skin, which looks to give older writers an opportunity to be published. 

We are extremely grateful to Adele for all her work judging this competition, including the written comments – going forward, such useful comments can hone writing skills for the future. Thank you Adele.

Without further delay, here are Adele’s comments and the Results!

Adele writes:
“I was thrilled to be asked and excited to read all the wonderful stories. When Katherine first asked me, I was equally honored and apprehensive as I know from judging other writing competitions that the sheer scope of the subjects tackled and the number of different genres can be vast. The entries for the Francis Copping Prize did not disappoint. I was blown away by the quality of the writing and the diversity of subjects, from a reimagining of the Arabian Nights to long-held family secrets, from ruminations on a dysfunctional family to murder. I found an engaging nugget in each story each time I reread them. So, I’d like to state the obvious: judging writing is subjective; a different judge would most certainly have chosen a different winner. That said, I’m now going to jump right.”

Highly Commended:

Beckett’s Wood

“In Beckett’s Wood, I loved how the writer conjured up a feeling of nostalgia and melancholy. I was rooting for Maureen, and I found her yearning for a life that might have been so relatable. I also appreciated that the ending was not wrapped in a fairytale-like bow.”

Fast Food

“In Fast Food, I thought the writer did a great job creating Catherine’s character, dropping in details about her concern with her outward appearance while giving the reader privy to her internal conflict during her working day. Her real hunger mirrors her hunger for success at work and creates a great tension that propels the reader along with Catherine as she goes about her day. By the end, I was itching to make the poor girl a sandwich.”

Third Place

Business Jargon

“This story was quirky, funny, and very clever. The way the writer used surreal imagery to critique modern corporate culture is so inventive. I love how words and letters are described as physical, living things—creeping, skittering, and attaching themselves to people. The descriptions were so visceral they made me want to scratch, such as, “I’d be spending the next hour under the hot flow of the office shower, combing them, teasing them, out from where hair met scalp, picking them from their hiding places under armpits, between thighs.”

This was a unique story that I enjoyed reading for its clever use of metaphor and inventiveness—my favorite phrases were, ‘past the word salad at the foot of the coffee machine,’ and ‘the draught excluder of small talk.’ I’d also like to give a shout-out to the title—short but effective.”

Second Place

African Nights

“This is a rich and compelling story. It captured both the magic of a safari holiday and the internal conflict of a troubled marriage. The setting is vividly described, and the writer uses the landscape and the animals as metaphors for the emotional journey of the protagonist, Jane. The African setting is beautifully illustrated from the ‘foam of the Milky Way bisecting the sky’ to ‘the shadowy indigo’ of the bushes in the moonlight. It also sets up a contrast between what Jane is seeing and what she is feeling about her husband. How the natural world intertwines with Jane’s emotional state adds extra layers; her interaction with the hyaena highlights her own ambivalence about her marriage and was skillfully done. The way this encounter firms up her resolve to leave her unhappy marriage is a cathartic moment. “She was free! She was on the holiday of a lifetime.” I almost cheered.”

First Place

The Dance

“I was hooked from the first paragraph. The writer skillfully takes us from a day full of sunshine and warmth to the sudden dark presence of Papi, whose whole demeanor casts a dark shadow over the family. The voice of the narrator, a twelve-year-old girl, is vulnerable and illustrates her naivety about a situation she is struggling to understand, making it very effective at packing an emotional punch.

The powerful symbolism of the family dynamic described as a dance where each member knows their place and moves around in a certain way to avoid confrontation works so well. The repetition of this dance—dodging Papi’s anger, calming his moods—gives a sense of a tragic routine. One of the things that makes a story successful is pacing, and in The Dance, the pacing is strong. The flip from a lovely, gentle day to the gathering darkness brought about by Papi’s appearance through to the violence creates a buildup of tension, which is why the thrown potato feels so cathartic, shocking the characters and the reader out of the pattern of the dance. Then, the ending is haunting and heartbreaking as the narrator realizes her mother will not support her in reporting the father’. The writer did an excellent job of capturing the struggle of a child caught in the cycle of abuse in a world that is difficult for most people to understand and even more challenging to confront. Bravo!”

Many congratulations to the following :

1^st Place: ‘The Dance’ by Diane Williams

2^nd Place: ‘African Nights’ by Corinne Harris

3^rd Place: ‘Business Jargon’ By Helen Smith

Highly Commended – ‘Becketts Wood’ by Alan Oberman, and ‘Fast Food’ by Jean O’Donoghue.

Special congratulations to our worthy winner Diane Williams.

“Writing has always been an important part of Diane Williams’ life. She considers it a good friend. Diane comes originally from the South Wales Valleys but relocated twenty years ago to the Hay on Wye area. Most of her career was spent in Nursing and Education and she now works part time in an art gallery in Hay on Wye.

This is Diane’s first prize for fiction, though she has been writing for many years, covering a range of styles and genres. She feels that the prize is a welcome validation of her work and a step in the right direction towards publication for a wider audience.”

The Dance

By Diane Williams

It had been a beautiful Spring day. Mama and I had opened all the windows and let the outside in. We spent the whole time in the sunshine, moving between garden, woods and house, collecting odds and ends to create a fun, natural sculpture. We hung some bird feeders on it and sat on the door step, drinking tea and watching the birds. Mama and I glowed with the feeling of this shared day and lightness filled the cottage. Later, as dusk gathered, we settled ourselves in the kitchen preparing our supper. I was peeling potatoes and Mama was drying a pile of dishes.

   
We were chatting about the music we loved and laughing, as we tried to sing some of our favourites. So, we missed the car’s lights, as it drove up to the house and didn’t hear Papi walking up to the back door. That must have been when we were choosing a Kate Bush CD from the living room. There was some discussion, as Mama wanted The Dreaming, I wanted Ariel. I won of course! We were back in the kitchen, fiddling with the CD player when Papi arrived, dragging a lead cloak of misery behind him. I watched Mama quietly put down the CD. She stiffened and all the light left her. She was extinguished. I felt the muscles across my upper back tighten. We all stood facing each other in the now cold, still kitchen and with a heavy heart, I thought “Let the dance begin.”

  
A smile and Hi! from Mama, silence from Papi. He lowers his looming bulk solidly onto the kitchen chair. I watch Mama relax. She thinks it’s going to be ok. She starts talking about the CDs we’ve chosen and the casserole she’s got out of the freezer and could I peel a few extra potatoes please? Papi sighs and gets up, walks to the sink, fills the kettle, switches it on and returns to the sink. Still no words from him. He steps closer to Mama, so close that she can’t put her arm down, she’s stuck there holding a white bowl, now leaning slightly back against the draining board. Papi looks down at Mama’s head and says quietly, slowly, something like it’s not enough to rub his nose in her recent success. Now she feels the need to show her abilities in his field of work too.

  
I laugh out loud! Does he mean our bird feeder? Was that such a good sculpture that it matched his work?! On it’s way to the Tate any day!! Is he mad?! They’re so engrossed in the dance that I am ignored. Mama steps away, making light of it and busying herself. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Papi so angry, fizzing like a firework before it launches. I try to calm things and ask him, in as normal a way as possible, how his day has been. He still ignores me and again moves closer to Mama. I am the silent observer. I am well practiced. In this moment, nothing else exists, other than Mama and Papi and what happens next. This time he grabs her arm and starts asking her questions about some man she’s supposed to know. Mama is shaking her head, trying to move away. He wants her to look at him but she’s trying really hard not to. Frozen to the spot, I look at my parents and feel sorry for them. Mama is gripping that cotton tea towel she bought on our visit to the Eden Project, two years ago, like some floral shield.  I see that Papi still bites his nails. How many times has he tried to stop?

  
But this bad stuff, the way he behaves, is old ground. Mama and I have seen it all before and manage to dance around it quite frequently, calming him, dodging him, staying invisible. Amazingly, we’ve never done this together before. Caught in this moment, I vaguely realise how liberating it is! No more avoiding the issue, no more pretending. It feels to me like we’ve been three separate people playing at being a family. Just dancing around this issue. Not anymore. I watch his hand move slowly from her arm to her throat, the potato and knife still in my hand, though I’ve forgotten about the peeling.  A strange sound comes from Mama’s throat and I’m suddenly back in the room. She’s struggling for breath! Her knees are buckling and I notice a faint smirk form on Papi’s face. His power is once again absolute. Breathe in, arm swings back, aim, breathe out as I throw. So simple. The large potato rockets through the kitchen and explodes across his forehead. Papi’s face is pasted in potato. I’m impressed with myself. What an aim! Two things happen quickly: He drops Mama like a rag doll, her body folding onto the floor as she gasps for air and Papi covers the length of the kitchen in a millisecond. He pins me to the wall and punches me in the head. That’s all I remember for a while.

 
The following morning, I heard Papi singing in the shower as usual. I go to find Mama. I wanted to speak to her about the night before. She was in her studio, chatting and laughing on her mobile to her friend. I took the opportunity to look at the beginnings of bruises on her throat, arms and cheek. She ended the call and I told her I was going to ring the police about charging Papi with assault. Mama sat down and just looked at me, like she was shocked, then she started shaking her head, saying No a lot. These are the reasons she gave for me not to ring the police: 1. He didn’t mean it. 2. The family wouldn’t like it, they’d see you as a trouble maker. 3. Papi is stressed at the moment with his new exhibition coming up. We don’t  want to upset him. 4. Do you want to break up the family? What would happen to you? 5. You shouldn’t have provoked him. And 6. I won’t support you. You’re on your own.

That sort of broke my heart.

   
As with all good dancers, Papi’s timing was excellent because he then appeared, all smiles, saying he’d made coffee and was hoping we’d join him, his two best women. But the thing is, you see, I’m not a woman. I’m only twelve. A twelve -year- old who dances alone.

Poetry Competition – Deadline Looms.

Just a couple more days left to enter our 2025 Poetry Competition with £100 first Prize! Anyone can enter a poem on any theme – maximum limit of 40 lines – for full details go to our Competitions page.

Good Luck!

And finally, Wishing Everyone a very Happy Easter Holiday.

If you are in the neighbourhood this week don’t miss out on this
stunning event in Llandrindod!

An Evening of Poetry with Music – Thursday 24th April

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