The Editorial Training Writing Competition 2010

In March this year we invited submissions of no more than 2,000 words on the theme of A perfect start to a publishing career.

The competition was open to anyone who works – or has worked – in book publishing in the UK.

We expected the standard to be high, but we were still quite taken aback by the standard of writing.

The eventual winner was Mike Bedo, who took an imaginative step back in time to 1892 and the trials of Oscar Wilde.

There were also a few other notable entries, which we thought deserved a mention, and you'll find links to them below.

The Winner – Editorial Training Writing Competition 2010:

A Perfect Start to a Career in Publishing... circa 1892

by Mike Bedo

This morning two well-dressed men came to the forge asking to speak to me. Their names were Littlechild and Kearley, and they have paid me generously to set down on paper what you now see before you. At their request I must cast my memory back some three years to the early months of 1892. In those days I was a gentleman – or I was about to become one. I had recently commenced employment as a junior clerk in the offices of Elkin Mathews and John Lane, publishers... Read the full story.

Other notable entries (in no particular order):

Frederic Carston's Last Book

by Gurdeep Mattu

Zombie Poodles, Pickled Bird Heads and Geri Halliwell's Knickers

by Abbie Todd

The Perfect Start

by Brian Martin

Linguistics

by Kersti Halls

The Ameliorative Effects from Heartbreak

by Walter Hartford

The Perfect Start

by Heather Maisner