Originally Posted by
MarkBastable
Thank you very much to all sixty-odd who took the time to read the stories and vote. That was a damn close-run thing, and I'm delighted to have won by a nose, whilst being fully aware that - when it's that close - it's practically a toss-up. If the voting had carried on another day, I could just as easily have been one behind.
Can I just address this 'professional writer' thing? First, I guess it depends what you mean by professional. I've never made a living from writing - I've always had a 'proper job'. And I haven't written anything for money for over a decade. I might try to go back to it this year. But the point is, these days I write on a whim.
So it might be more relevant to say that I'm a published writer. Thing is though, being published doesn't necessarily make you a shoo-in for this kind of game. I know many published writers who'd struggle to write a story for this contest, just as I know many unpublished writers who are naturals for it. So I don't think I'm at any advantage in the contest because I've been published. I think being published and doing well in the contest are both effects of the same cause - which is that I wrote something that readers liked.
The question really, I suppose, is do we want a new rule saying that the competition is open only to unpublished writers? The organisers could easily make such a rule - the only slight problem would be defining 'published'. But in principle, it's easy to do.